
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS 



BY 



CHAUNCEY WRIGHT 



WITH A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF THE AUTHOR 



CHARLES ELIOT NORTON 
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NEW YORK 
HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 

1877 









Copyright, 1876, by 
HENRY HOLT. 



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Ithaca, V \ 



John K. Trow & Son, Printers, 
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PREFATOPvY NOTE. 

This volume contains the greater part of the published writ- 
ings of its author. The beginning of the article on "Lewes's 
Problems of Life and Mind," and the fragment on " Cause 
and Effect " are now published for the first time. 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

Biographical Sketch Ob Chauncey Wright vii 

A Physical Theory of the Universe i 

Natural Theology as a Positive Science 35 

The Philosophy of Herbert Spencer 43 

Limits of Natural Selection 97 

The Genesis of Species 128 

Evolution by Natural Selection 168 

Evolution of Self-Consciousness 199 

The Conflict of Studies 267 

The Uses and Origin of the Arrangements of Leaves in 

Plants 296 

McCosh on Intuitions 329 

Mansel's Reply to Mill 350 

Lewes's Problems of Life and Mind 360 

McCosh on Tyndall 375 

Speculative Dynamics 385 

Books Relating to the Theory of Evolution 394 

German Darwinism 398 

A Fragment on Cause and Effect 406 

John Stuart Mill — A Commemorative Notice 414 

Index 429 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF CHAUNCEY 
WRIGHT. 

BY CHARLES ELIOT NORTON. 

Chauncey Wright died in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on 
the 12th of September, 1875, aged forty-five years. 

His name was not widely known. He had written compar- 
atively little. A few essays by him on scientific subjects had 
appeared in "The Mathematical Monthly," and the " Memoirs" 
and " Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sci- 
ences"; he had contributed several articles, mostly upon phil- 
osophical topics, to the "North American Review," and he 
had printed numerous briefer papers in "The Nation." His 
work gave evidence not only of a mind of rare power and un- 
usual balance,. but also of wide acquisitions and thorough in- 
tellectual discipline, and he had won recognition from compe- 
tent judges as a philosophical thinker of a high order, from 
whom much was to be expected. 

To collect his principal writings, and to present them in a 
form accessible to students was a duty to his memory, and in 
the interest of philosophy. Fragmentary, as of necessity such 
a collection must be, and but imperfectly representative of the 
scope of the author's mind, the general character of his philo- 
sophical opinions and method may clearly enough be learned 
from it. 

It seemed desirable to prefix to this selection from his writ- 
ings an account of the author, not merely to gratify the nat- 



viii CHAUNCEY WRIGHT. 

ural desire of his readers to know something of the man to 
whom they might owe the incitement of thought, but still more 
because the character of Chauncey Wright was no less remark- 
able than his intelligence, and was of such uncommon and ad- 
mirable quality that upon those who knew him intimately his 
death fell as a great misfortune, and has. left a void in their 
lives that can never be filled. 

The task of preparing this account has been assigned to me 
as one who knew him well, especially during the last fifteen 
years of his life, and who had enjoyed the happiness of his close 
and helpful friendship. The external events of his life were 
not striking, and all that need be told of them can be said in 
a few words. 

Chauncey Wright was born in Northampton, in the year 1830. 
His father and mother were of old New England stock, with 
such characters and habits as were the results of a long suc- 
cession of generations who had lived simply and seriously, 
transmitting from one to another the traditions of labor, fru- 
gality, domestic comfort, and intelligence. His father was an 
active man in his town, carrying on a successful country trade, 
and occupied with the various duties of the office of a deputy- 
sheriff of the county, a post which he filled for many years. 
Wright's boyhood was fortunate in the advantages common to 
New England country boys at a time when the conditions 
which have, during the present generation, wrought so rapid 
and great a change in American society, had hardly begun to 
manifest themselves. The circumstances of his life were em- 
inently wholesome. He was an affectionate, reserved, and 
thoughtful boy, fond of animals and plants, observant of their 
habits, and in general more interested in outdoor than indoor 
pursuits. He did not especially distinguish himself at school, 
except, perhaps, in mathematics and in the writing of compo- 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. ix 

sitions, which he often preferred to write in verse rather than 
in prose. No strong personal influence seems to have affected 
the natural development of his intelligence; and, though neither 
solitary nor unsocial, he worked out much by himself the 
problems and devices of his youth, and early displayed the 
solid independence of his mind and character. He had a se- 
rious disposition, and even in early years he, at times, suffered 
from a tendency toward melancholy. He entered Harvard 
College in 1848. His classical attainments were slight, and he 
took little interest in the study either of languages or of litera- 
ture. The bent of his mind was strong toward abstract pur- 
suits, and he applied himself chiefly to mathematics and phi- 
losophy, displaying the acuteness and originality of his intel- 
ligence in his themes and other written exercises. He had a 
certain inertness of temperament which caused the action of 
his mind to appear slow and difficult. But often when he 
seemed least active, he was engaged in reflection, and the 
want of brilliancy or vivacity of power was more than compen- 
sated for by solidity of acquisition, as well as by the assimila- 
tion of his knowledge with his thought. He learned slowly, 
but he knew whatever he learned. His memory was retentive, 
and well disciplined, so that its stores not only became abun- 
dant, but were also held in good order for service. One of 
the most marked features of his intellectual nature, even at 
this comparatively early date, was the steadiness and consistency 
of its growth. There was nothing desultory in the pursuit of 
his aims; and, though his efforts were often intermittent, they 
were not dispersed. 

His modesty and reserve combined with the nature of his 
interests to prevent him from being well known by any large 
circle of acquaintances; but the disinterestedness of his dispo- 
sition and the amiability of his temper endeared him to a few 



x CHAUNCEY WRIGHT. 

intimate friends, while his classmates generally felt for him more 
than ordinary regard and respect. 

Soon after leaving college, in 1852, he was appointed one of 
the computers for the recently established "American Ephem- 
eris and Nautical Almanac." By occasional contributions 
to the "Mathematical Monthly" and other journals, he grad- 
ually won repute as a mathematician and physicist of distin- 
guished ability and accomplishment. In 1863 he was made 
Recording Secretary of the American Academy of Arts and 
Sciences, a place which he held for seven years, and which 
gave opportunity not only for the exercise of his sound judg- 
ment in practical questions, but for the exhibition of critical 
discrimination in the editing of the Academy's " Proceedings." 

His attention gradually became more and more fixed upon 
the questions in metaphysics and philosophy presented in their 
latest form in the works of Mill, Darwin, Bain, Spencer, and 
others, and in 1864 he published in the "North American 
Review," then under my charge, the first of a series of phil- 
osophical essays, of which the last appeared only two months 
before his death, and of which it is not too much to say that 
they form the most important contribution made in America to 
the discussion and investigation of the questions which now 
chiefly engage the attention of the students of philosophy. 

From the time of his leaving college to his death, he resided, 
with brief intervals of absence, in Cambridge. In 1872, he 
spent a few months in Europe. In 1870 he delivered a course 
of University Lectures in Harvard College on the principles 
of Psychology. In 1874-75, he was instructor in Harvard 
College in Mathematical Physics. 

He lived all his life simply, frugally, and modestly. He had 
few wants, and he used a considerable part of his somewhat 
scanty means to add to the comfort of those who were dear to 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. xi 

him. He had what may be truly called an elevated nature, 
not remote from human interests, but above all selfishness or 
meanness. The motives by which the lives of common men 
are determined had little influence with him. He did not feel 
the spur of ambition, or the sting of vanity. No thought of 
personal advantage, no jealousy of others, affected his judg- 
ment or his conduct. His principles were so firmly established 
that his moral superiority seemed not so much the result of 
effort as the expression of what was natural to him. His sym- 
pathies were not stimulated by his mode of life, but they were 
keen, and so interpenetrated by his intelligence that in cases 
of need they made him one of the most helpful of men. 
He was, for instance, admirable as a nurse by the sick-bed, 
alike tender and firm; and while the touch of his hand and 
the modulation of his Voice afforded the invalid unwonted 
comfort and repose, the steadiness of his judgment gave 
the' supporting tone so often wanting in the sick-room. The 
same qualities brought him frequently into happy relations 
with children and with old people. If his imagination once 
felt the appeal, his adaptation of his strength to their weak- 
ness, of his multiplicity of resource to their need of enter- 
tainment, was so complete as to w T in for him the love of 
young and old. He was fond of games with children, and 
would devote himself to their amusement with unwearied pa- 
tience and spirit. He had great skill in sleight-of-hand, and 
frequently amused himself with finding out and reproducing 
the tricks of the most renowned jugglers. He would hardly 
have been suspected by a casual acquaintance to be a master 
in legerdemain; for his massive build and heavy proportions, 
and the absence of agility in his common movements, seemed 
to unfit him for performances of this sort. But, after seeing 
him display his dexterity, it was easily recognized as the out- 



xii CHAUNCEY WRIGHT. 

growth and indication of faculties already exercised in higher 
fields. The same fine touch and precise and delicate move- 
ment which were shown in his nursing, the same quick and ex- 
act vision which distinguished his observation as a physicist 
were exhibited in his feats of parlor magic. He brought 
his keen analytical powers to bear on the seemingly mysterious 
processes of jugglers or of spiritualists; he used his knowledge 
of mechanics in the construction of toys, and applied his 
mathematical genius to the invention and performance of mar- 
velous games and puzzles of cards. 

I dwell thus at length on what might seem a mere trivial 
accomplishment, not only because it affords a vivid illustration 
of marked personal traits, but more because it was the means 
by which he gave concrete and visible expression to certain 
mental qualities trained to rare perfection in higher fields of 
exertion. 

His temper was naturally calm, and he early attained a de- 
gree of self-discipline that enabled him to keep it under com- 
plete control. He was fond of debate and argument, and the 
full force of his mind was brought out through the animation 
of talk, more than in the solitary exercise of writing. Yet he 
was seldom ruffled by controversy, and never made ungenerous 
use of his strength, or forced his opponent to pass through the 
Caudine Forks of unwilling concession and acknowledgment 
of defeat. This control of his own temper secured that of his 
adversary. To argue with him was a moral no less than an 
intellectual discipline. The words he used of Mill apply with 
equal fitness 4o himself. " He sincerely welcomed intelligent 
and earnest opposition with a deference due to truth itself, and 
to a just regard of the diversities in men's minds from differ- 
ences of education and natural dispositions. These diversities 
even appeared to him essential to the completeness of the ex- 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. xiii 

animation which the evidences of truth demand. Opinions 
positively erroneous, if intelligent and honest, are not without 
their value, since the progress of truth is a succession of mis- 
takes and corrections. Truth itself, unassailed by .erroneous 
opinion, would soon degenerate into narrowness and error. 
The errors incident to individuality of mind and character are 
means, in the attrition of discussion, of keeping the truth 
bright and untarnished, and even of bringing its purity to 
light." 

It was in this spirit that Wright himself carried on the dis- 
cussions in which he engaged. He early learned that truth is 
a double question; and in the pursuit of truth, which was the 
controlling motive of his life, he disciplined himself by the 
study of opposing opinions. As he himself said, " Men are 
born either Platonists or Aristotelians ; but by their education 
through a more and more free and enlightened discussion, and 
by progress in the sciences, they are restrained more and more 
from going to extremes in the directions of their native biases." 
And this general remark may be applied with fitness to him- 
self. For while his intellectual operations were directed by a 
spirit of observation and experiment, which, though training 
the judgment and imagination in habits of accuracy, might 
.also have a tendency to direct the attention to exclusive views 
of truth, he was on the other hand in all matters of specula- 
tion, to use a phrase of Mr. Mill's, essentially a seeker, testing 
every opinion, and recognizing the difficulties which adhere to 
them all. He exhibited that union of science and. of philoso- 
phy which is the highest distinction of the leading thinkers of 
our time, and which hereafter will be indispensable for all who 
may succeed in deepening the current of thought or in open- 
ing for it new channels. 

It was a marked quality of his genius as a thinker, that its 



xiv CHA UNCE Y WRIGHT. 

springs were mainly fed from other sources than those of 
books. He was no wide reader; but, making himself master 
of a few comprehensive books, he gained from them, by re- 
flection upon them, much more than their mere contents. He 
was never a persistent and systematic student; but he was es- 
sentially a persistent and systematic thinker. 

During his college life he had been a judicious reader of 
Emerson and of Lord Bacon, but in the years of his early 
manhood, while he was accumulating large stores of observa- 
tion and reflection, two or three books, similar in interest, but 
widely different in spirit and in method, were of special interest 
and importance to him, — chiefly Sir William Hamilton's Dis- 
sertations and Lectures, and Mill's Political Economy and his 
System of Logic. The repute and influence of Hamilton as a 
metaphysician and psychologist have undoubtedly declined 
since the publication, in 1865, of Mill's Examination of his 
Philosophy, — a philosophy, which professed to combine in an 
original form the German and French developments of the 
earlier Scotch reaction against Locke and Hume, with the 
demonstrations of modern science in respect to the necessary 
limits of knowledge. Hamilton had, however, succeeded 
previously not only in re-awakening among English students a 
fresh interest in metaphysics, but also in exercising a strong 
influence upon the general current of philosophical opinion. 
It was his great service, and one which will always deserve 
recognition, whatever be the ultimate verdict upon his special 
doctrines, that he produced a real revival of interest in a sub- 
ject of fundamental importance which for a generation at least 
had ceased to receive due attention, and that he forced once 
more upon the consciousness of his generation the conviction 
that a true Psychology is, in the words of Mr. Mill, "the in- 
dispensable scientific basis of Morals, of Politics, and of the 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. xv 

science and art of Education," and that upon the resolution 
of the difficulties of metaphysics, using the word in its proper 
sense, depends the assurance of the solid foundation of all 
knowledge. For this stimulus, and for this conviction, Wright, 
like many others, was indebted to his early studies of Hamil- 
ton. But he had studied Hamilton too thoroughly, and with 
too much clearness of mind, not to have become aware, even 
before Mill's exposure of them, of some at least of the weak 
points and inconclusive determinations of his system. 

But Mill's work was much more than a simple refutation of 
the errors of Hamilton. In accomplishing this, he did much 
to re-establish, and upon more solid foundations than before, 
certain principles in philosophy of which the validity had 
seemed to be shaken. He showed that the determination of 
the vexed problems of metaphysics was to be sought in a- 
properly scientific, and not in an a priori, or spiritualist psy- 
chology. His work went far to determine the mutual depend- 
ence of mental philosophy and of experimental science, the 
general recognition of which has already become effective in 
determining their respective courses of advance. The doctrine 
of experience may not yet be the dominant doctrine of the En- 
glish school of psychologists; but the fact is obvious, that the 
recent independent investigations of science, and the rapid and 
unforeseen developments of knowledge, have tended to confirm 
its main propositions, and to strengthen its claim to accept- 
ance. With this doctrine in psychology, the ill-named but 
generally well-understood doctrine of utilitarianism in morals is 
closely associated, so closely indeed that one may be said to be 
in great measure dependent on the other. Whatever contributes 
to the support of either, contributes more or less directly to the 
support of both. It may not be correct to assert, that if either 
be overthrown the other must fall with it; but it is at least 



xvi CHAUNCEY WRIGHT. 

certain, that the validity of a great part of each depends on 
evidence common to both. The consistency among the postu- 
lates of psychology, and morals, has never been so clearly mani- 
fest, and has never received such valuable exposition, as during 
the last twenty years, mainly through the efforts of English in- 
vestigators and thinkers, with Mill and Darwin at their head. 

The effect of Mill's doctrine upon the direction of Wright's 
thought was confirmed ,by that of Darwin's work on The 
Origin of Species by means of Natural Selection. The strong 
moral element in the works of both writers found a warm re- 
sponse in his own nature. The entire candor, the love of 
truth, the disinterested search for it, the patience of investiga- 
tion, the accuracy of statement, the modesty of assertion, 
characteristic of both these masters, were in entire harmony 
with his own mental traits. The conclusions and the theories 
of Mill and Darwin may be disputed, may be overthrown, but 
their respective methods of investigation and of statement are 
of such excellence, and their desire for truth so sincere and im- 
personal, that their works would remain as models of scientific 
investigation and philosophic inquiry even though they should 
lose their doctrinal authority. 

The questions opened and partially solved by these authors 
were those which chiefly occupied Wright during the last ten 
years of his life. The rare combination in him of a genius for 
reflection, disciplined by long exercise, with great natural powers 
of observation, and with unusually wide and accurate scientific 
attainments, fitted him to deal with them not merely as a re- 
porter of other men's thought, but as an original investigator, 
capable himself of making additions to the sum of knowledge. 
The position which he occupied as a philosopher is the stand- 
point common to one of the two fundamental divisions of the 
philosophic world; namely, that of the assumption of the uni- 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. xvii 

versality of physical causation. It cannot be stated better than 
in his own words. " The very hope of experimental philoso- 
phy/' he says, " its expectation of constructing the sciences into 
a true philosophy of nature, is based on the induction, or, if 
you please, the a priori presumption, that physical causation 
is universal ; that the constitution of nature is written in its 
actual manifestations, and needs only to be deciphered by ex- 
perimental and inductive research ; that it is not a latent in- 
visible writing, to be brought out by the magic of mental an- 
ticipation or metaphysical meditation. Or, as Bacon said, it 
is not by the ' anticipations of the mind,' but by the ' interpre- 
tation of nature,' that natural philosophy is to be constituted; 
and this is to presume that the order of nature is decipherable, 
or that causation is everywhere either manifest or hidden, but 
never absent." The methods of'this interpretation of nature 
or, in~other words, of this discovery of truth, he regarded as 
those of all true knowledge ; namely, the methods of induction 
from the facts of particular observation. This was his position 
in respect to the much-debated problem of metaphysical caus- 
ation, or the question of what are called "real connections be- 
tween phenomena as causes and effects, which are independent 
of our experiences, and the invariable and unconditional se- 
quences among them." " To those," I cite his own words, " who 
have reached the positive mode of thought, the word 'cause' 
simply signifies the phenomena, or the state of facts, which pre- 
cede the event to be explained, which make it exist, in the only 
sense in which it can clearly be supposed to be made to exist ; 
namely, by affording the conditions of the rule of its occur- 
rence. But with those," he adds, u . who have not yet attained 
to this clear and simple conception of cause, a vague but fa- 
miliar feeling prevails, which makes this conception seem very 
inadequate to express their idea of the reality of causation. 



xviii CHAUNCEY WRIGHT. 

Such thinkers feel that they know something more in causa- 
tion than the mere succession, however simple and invariable 
this may be. The real efficiency of a cause, that which makes 
its effect to exist absolutely, seems, at least in regard to their 
own volitions, to be known to them immediately." "But," 
he goes on, after an interval, "that certain mental states of 
which we are conscious are followed by certain external ef- 
fects which we observe is to the sceptical schools a simple fact 
of observation. These thinkers extend the method of the more 
precisely known to the interpretation of what is less precisely 
known, interpreting the phenomena of self-consciousness by 
the methods of physical science, instead of interpreting phys- 
ical phenomena by the crudities of the least perfect though 
most familiar of all observations, the phenomena of volition."* 
It is not to be assumed, from the phrase in the preceding 
extract concerning those "who have reached the positive 
mode of thought," that Wright classed himself with any spe- 
cific school of so-called Positivists. He used the term positive, 
as it is now commonly employed, as a general appellation to 
designate the whole body of thinkers who in the investigation 
of nature hold to the methods of induction from the facts 
of observation, as distinguished from the a priori school, who 
seek in the constitution of the mind the key to the inter- 
pretation of the external world. It was only in this sense that 
he himself was a positivist. So too with regard, to his use of 
the word "sceptical." In his employment of it, it had no di- 
rect theological significance. It meant with him the temper 
of mind which puts no confidence in assertion unsupported by 
the evidence of experience; it meant the temper of question- 
ing and investigation as opposed to that of concluded opinion; 

* North American Review, 106, p. 286, notice of Peabody's Positive Philosophy, 
January, 1868. 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. xix 

the temper in which the unknown remains matter of inquiry, 
not of dogmatism, and to which the unknowable, or that which 
lies plainly outside the range of human faculties, is of no con- 
cern save as matter of sentiment. To the quality of this sen- 
timent he gave great weight as a test of the worth of individ- 
ual character. His scepticism rested upon the proposition, 
that the highest generality, or universality, in the elements, or 
connections of elements, in phenomena, is the utmost reach 
both in the power and the desire of the scientific intellect. 
There was nothing aggressive in such scepticism as this, except 
so far as it led him to expose the fallacious arguments of the 
supporters of the orthodox metaphysics. The sympathetic, 
quality of his nature showed itself in his respect for individual 
beliefs sincerely held. He felt, to use his own words, "that 
the subordinate, almost incidental value that some traditional 
metaphysical issues, like the ultimate nature of the connection 
of mind and matter, and of cause and effect, and the depend- 
ence of life on matter, have in the view of the scientific psy- 
chologist, is with difficulty comprehended by those who ap- 
proach the subject from a religious point of view." He had no 
liking for the iconoclasts who would destroy ancient faiths in 
the hearts of those who are incapable of substituting, with good j 
effect on their lives, rational convictions in the place of senti- 
mental beliefs. He had confidence in the constant and pro- 
gressive extension of the field of knowledge; but he did not 
believe that the question of the origin and destiny of things 
would ever be included within its limits. If asked for his spec- 
ulations on these topics, that so greatly exercise the curiosity 
of the race, he would have been very likely to reply with the 
words of Newton, which were among his favorite apothegms, 
"Hypotheses 11011 Jingo." 

In the year 1870, Mr. Wright published the first of a series 



xx CHAUNCEY WRIGHT. 

of papers, of which the last appeared but a short time before 
his death, expository of the true nature of the doctrine of 
Natural Selection, of its various applications, and of its rela- 
tions to common metaphysical speculations. In the first of 
these articles, which had the form of a review of Mr. Wal- 
lace's contributions to the Theory of Natural Selection, Mr. 
Wright touches upon the application of the principles involved 
in the doctrine of Natural Selection to the development of the 
mental powers of man. The full importance of the topic did 
not, however, appear till the publication, more than two years 
afterward, of his most considerable contribution to philosophy, 
his essay on the Evolution of Self-Consciousness, in which a 
natural explanation is given of the chief phenomena of human 
consciousness, involving the' refutation of many of the main 
propositions of mystical metaphysics or idealism. In 1871, he 
published a paper on the Genesis of Species, in reply to Mr. 
St. George Mivart's attack on the theory of Natural Selection. 
The vigor and effectiveness of his defense of the theory led to 
the republication of this essay in England, at Mr. Darwin's 
instance, and compelled Mr. Mivart to attempt to make 
good his position in a communication to the " North American 
Review," the journal in which Mr. Wright's article originally 
appeared. To this reply Mr. Wright rejoined in the succeed- 
ing number of the "Review," July, 1872.* 

In these discussions of the problems of modern research, 
and other shorter papers on similar topics, published for the 
most part in "The Nation," Mr. Wright showed the wide reach 
of his thought, his powers of keen analysis, and the large store 
of his acquirements. His training in the sound scientific 
method of investigation gave precision to his statement of the 



* In his recently published work, entitled " Lessons from Nature as manifested in 
Mind and Matter," Mr. Mivart reprints his reply to Mr. Wright's criticisms, but fails to 
notice Mr. Wright's rejoinder. 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. xxi 

inductions of philosophic thought. He carried the scientific 
method into the region of reflection. In respect to all matters 
concerning which the facts necessary for the formation of opin- 
ion were not known, or had been but insufficiently observed, 
he held a suspended judgment. He never seemed to have a 
prepossession in favor of or against any opinion, concerning 
which the testimony of experience was doubtful, and the evi- 
dence of fact apparently inconsistent. 

But his thought was by no means limited to the topics which 
philosophy derives from the exact or the natural sciences. The 
main attraction of science and philosophy to him was not on 
the side of abstract truth, but much more on the application of 
truth to the life and conduct of man. The questions of morality, 
of politics, of jurisprudence, of education, in the light thrown on 
them by psychology and by experience, were those which in 
his later years were continually assuming an increasing share 
of his attention. And in his treatment of these questions he 
displayed the most eminent trait of his genius, and the highest 
result of the discipline of his philosophic powers, — I mean a 
good practical judgment, or the quality of wisdom. Chauncey 
Wright was in the true sense a wise man. I do not assert, 
that, in the ordering of his own life, he was always guided by 
the considerations of wisdom. In some important respects his 
self-control was greatly deficient in steadiness. Few, indeed, of 
the wisest men have succeeded in conforming their lives in all 
respects to their principles. Wisdom more frequently manifests 
itself in objective relations, than in the complete mastery of , 
personal dispositions, and a consistently judicious regulation of/ 
conduct. And, in all matters in which the interests of others 
were involved, Mr. Wright's judgment was one of the most 
trustworthy. His sympathetic nature gave him the power to 
enter into moods of character and conditions of feeling widely 



xxii CHAUNCEY WRIGHT. 

diverse from his own, while his judgment in each particular in- 
stance was the result of inductions of large experience and 
careful reflection. Instant as the expression of his opinions 
might be, there was nothing of haste in their formation. Emo- 
tion, sentiment, opinion, all rested with him on a rational foun- 
dation. I should give a false image, if, in thus speaking. I 
were to convey the impression of anything dry or forma.ly 
deliberate in his intercourse with others. He was, especially 
in his later years, always ready and fluent in talk, easily ani- 
mated, accessible to the ideas of others, neither preoccupied 
with his own reflections to the exclusion of external sugges- 
tions, nor using the predominant weight of his own intelligence 
to crush the slighter fabric of the thought of his companions. 
He had the modesty of the philosopher in happy combination 
with his just self-confidence, and the vigor of his moral senti- 
ment was as evident in the manner as in the substance of his 
discourse. I have referred to his tendency in early life to mel- 
ancholy. He was never wholly free from occasional periods 
in which some defect of physical organization or constitution 
showed itself in uncontrollable mental depression. But he 
was for. the most part cheerful, and often gay. He was an 
easy and equable companion, and the lighter regions of life 
and thought were as open and accessible to him, as the grave 
solitudes in which he habitually dwelt. 

Those who knew him best will most clearly discern the fact 
that his published writings, able as they are, and deserving of 
the respect due to high qualities of thought, fall short of being 
a satisfactory expression, even of the purely intellectual part of 
his nature. The action of his mind in composition was labo- 
i rious, and his style was often too compact of thought, and not 
sufficiently relieved by the lighter graces of expression. His 
writings and his oral lectures sometimes required closer atten- 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. xxiii 

tion on the part of readers or hearers than it would have been , 
well to demand of them. His thought, indeed, was never 
obscure ; but it was too condensed, and at times too profound 
to be readily followed. His own ability misled him, and he 
did not always estimate aright the average incapacity of un- 
trained intelligence to follow a process of exact reasoning. But 
nothing of this defect was to be found in his conversation,which 
was constantly lighted up by the pleasant play of a suggestive 
humor, that often added a happy and unexpected stroke where- 
with to clinch the point of argument. In talk, the readiness of 
his intelligence was not less remarkable than its force ; and the 
abundance and variety of his resources not less surprising than 
their accuracy. Whatever he knew was at his command, and 
his knowledge extended over many fields with which he might 
not have been supposed to be familiar. One could hardly turn 
to him with a question on any topic, however remote from his 
ordinary studies, without receiving from him an answer that 
seemed as if he already had devoted special attention to the 
subject now for the first time presented. The method of his 
thought was so excellent that new topics fell naturally into 
their right positions, and received immediate illustration from 
previous acquisitions, made originally without reference to any 
such application. With such capacities as his, and with such 
training as he had given them, the growth of his mind was con- 
stant. There was no period* to his progress, and what he had 
done seemed but the beginning and assurance of the greater 
things of which he was capable. His sudden death in the full- 
ness of power was a loss to be mourned by all who have at 
heart the interests of philosophy ; that is, by all to whom the 
highest interests of man are of concern. 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE * 

In 1811 Sir William Herschel communicated to the Royal 
Society a paper in which he gave an exposition of his famous 
hypothesis of the transformation of nebulae into stars. " As- 
suming a self-luminous substance of a highly attenuated nature 
to be distributed through the celestial regions, he endeavored 
to show that, by the mutual attraction of its constituent parts, 
it would have a tendency to form itself into distinct aggrega- 
tions of nebulous matter, which in each case would gradually 
condense from the continued action of the attractive forces, 
until the resulting mass finally acquired the consistency of a 
solid body, and became a star. In those instances wherein the 
collection of nebulous matter was very extensive, subordinate 
centres of attraction could not fail to be established, around 
which the adjacent particles would arrange themselves; and 
thus the whole mass .would in process of time be transformed 
into a determinate number of discrete bodies, which would 
ultimately assume the condition of a cluster of stars. Her- 
schel pointed out various circumstances which appeared to him 
to afford just grounds for believing that such a nebulous sub- 
stance existed independently in space: He maintained that 
the phenomena of nebulous stars, and the changes observable 
in the great nebula of Orion, could not be satisfactorily ac- 
counted for by any other hypothesis. Admitting, then, the 
existence of a nebulous substance, he concluded, from indica- 
tions of milky nebulosity which he encountered in the course 
of his observations, that it was distributed in great abundance 
throughout the celestial regions. The vast collections of neb- 

* From the North American Review, July. 1864. 



2 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

ulre which he had observed, of every variety of structure and 
in every stage of condensation, were employed by him with 
admirable address in illustrating the modus operandi of his 
hypothesis. " * 

Laplace, in his Systeme du Monde, applied this hypothesis, 
by an ingenious but simple use of mechanical principles, to 
the explanation of the origin of the planetary bodies, and of 
the general features of their movements in the solar system. 
Supposing the original nebulous mass to receive a rotatory 
motion by its aggregation, he showed that this motion would 
be quickened by a further contraction of the mass, until the 
centrifugal force of its equatorial regions would be sufficient to 
balance their gravitation, and to suspend them in the form of 
a vaporous ring. Again, supposing this revolving ring to be 
broken, and finally collected by a further aggregation into a 
spherical nebulous mass, he showed, in the same way, how the 
body of a planet, with its system of satellites, might be formed. 
The material and the original motions of the planets and their 
satellites could thus, he supposed, be successively produced, 
as the nebula gradually contracted to the dimensions of the 
sun. 

No scientific theory has received a fairer treatment than the 
nebular hypothesis. Arising as it did as a speculative conclu- 
sion from one of the grandest inductions in the whole range 
of physical inquiry, — connecting as it does so many facts, 
though vaguely and inconclusively, into one system, — it pos- 
sesses, what is rare in so bold and heterodox a view, a veri- 
similitude quite disproportionate to the real evidence which 
can be adduced in its support. The difficulties which ordina- 
rily attend the reception of new ideas, were in this case removed 
beforehand. The hypothesis violated no habitual association 
of ideas, at least among those who were at all competent to 
comprehend its import. Though resting on a much feebler 
support of direct evidence than the astronomical theories of 
Copernicus, Galileo, and Kepler, it met with a cordial recep- 
tion from its apparent accordance with certain preconceptions, 
of the same kind as those, which, though extrinsic and irrele- 

* Grain's History of Physical Astronomy. 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. 3 

vant to scientific inquiry, were able to oppose themselves suc- 
cessfully for a long time to the ascertained truths of modern 
astronomy. 

The test of conceivableness, the receptivity of the imagina- 
tion, is a condition, if not of truth itself, at least of belief in the 
truth; and in this respect the nebular hypothesis was well 
founded. It belonged to that class of theories of which it is 
sometimes said, "that, if they are not true, they desenie to be 
true." A place was already prepared for it in the imaginations 
and the speculative interests of the scientific world. 

We propose to review briefly some of the conditions which 
have given so great a plausibility to this hypothesis. In the 
first place, on purely speculative grounds, this hypothesis, as 
a cosmological theory, happily combines the excellences of 
the two principal doctrines on the origin of the world that 
were held by the ancients, and which modern theorists have 
discussed as views which, though neither can b^ established 
scientifically, have no less interest from a theological point of 
view; — namely, first, the materialistic doctrine, that the world, 
though finite in the duration of its orderly successions and 
changes, is infinite in the duration of its material substance; 
and, secondly, the spiritualistic doctrine, that matter and form 
are equally the effects, finite in duration, of a spiritual and 
eternal cause. 

At first sight the nebular hypothesis seems to agree most 
nearly with the materialistic cosmology, as taught by the 
greater number of the ancient philosophers; but the resem- 
blance is only superficial, and, though the hypothesis possesses 
those qualities by which the ancient doctrine was suited to the 
limitations and requirements of the poetical imagination, yet 
it does sot involve that element of fortuitous causation which 
gave to the ancient doctrine its atheistic character. In the 
nebular hypothesis the act of creation, though- reduced to its 
simplest form, is still essentially the same as tha't which a spir- 
itualistic cosmology requires. The first created matter filling 
the universe is devoid only of outward and developed forms, 
but contains created within it the forces which shall determine 
every change and circumstance of its subsequent history. 



4 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

The hypothesis being thus at once simple and theistic appeals 
to imagination and feeling as one which at least ought to be 
true. 

Such considerations as these doubtless determined the fate 
of another ancient cosmological doctrine, which, though 
adopted by Aristotle, was regarded with little favor by an- 
cient philosophers generally. For there could be but little 
support, either from poetry or religion, to the doctrine which 
denied creation, and held that the order of nature is not, in its 
cosmical relations, a progression toward an end, or a develop- 
ment, but is rather an endless succession of changes, simple 
and constant in their elements/though infinite in their combi- 
nations, which constitute an order without beginning and with- 
out termination. 

While this latter doctrine was not necessarily materialistic, 
like that which has been so termed, and which was more gen- 
erally received among the ancients, and though it has the 
greater scientific simplicity, yet it fails on a point of prime im- 
portance, so far as its general acceptance is concerned, in that 
it ignores the main interest which commonly attaches to the 
problem. Cosmological speculations are, indeed, properly con- 
cerned with the mode or order of the creation, and not with 
the fact of the creation itself. But that the first cosmogonies 
were written in verse shows the almost dramatic interest which 
their themes inspired. "In the beginning" has never ceased 
to charm the imagination; and these are almost the only 
words in our own sacred cosmogony to which the modern 
geologist has not been compelled to give some ingenious inter- 
pretation. That there was a beginning of the order of natural 
events and successions may be said to be the almost universal 
faith of Christendom. 

The nebular hypothesis, conforming to this preconception 
and to the greatest poetic simplicity, passed the ordeal of un- 
scientific criticism with remarkable success. Not less was its 
success under a general scientific review. A large number of 
facts and relations, otherwise unaccounted for, become expli- 
cable as at least very probable consequences of its assumptions ; 
and these assumptions were not, at first, without that indepen- 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. s 

dent probability which a true scientific theory requires. The 
existence of the so-called nebulous matter was rendered very 
probable by the earlier revelations of the telescope ; and, though 
subsequent researches in stellar astronomy have rather dimin- 
ished than increased the antecedent probability of the theory, by 
successively resolving the nebulae into clusters of star-like con- 
stituents, — suggesting that all nebulosity may arise from defi- 
ciency in the optical powers of the astronomer rather than in- 
here in the constitution of the nebulae themselves, — and thereby 
invalidating the scientific completeness of the theory, yet the 
plausible explanations which it still affords of the constitution 
of the solar system have saved it from condemnation with a 
considerable number of ingenious thinkers. With astrono- 
mers generally, however, it has gradually fallen in esteem. It 
retains too much of its original character of a happy guess, 
and has received too little confirmation of a precise and definite 
kind, to entitle it to rank highly as a physical theory. 

But there are two principal grounds on which it will doubt- 
less retain its claim to credibility, till its place is supplied, if 
this ever happens, by some more satisfactory account of cos- 
mical phenomena. To one of these grounds we have just 
alluded. The details of the constitution of the solar system 
present, as we have said, many features which suggest a phys- 
ical origin, directing inquiry as to how they were produced, 
rather than as to why they exist, — an inquiry into physical, 
rather than final causes ; features of the same mixed character 
of regularity and apparent accident which are seen in the 
details of geological or biological phenomena; features not 
sufficiently regular to indicate a simple primary law, either 
physical or teleological, nor yet sufficiently irregular to show 
an absence of law and relation in their production. 

The approximation of the orbits of the planets to a common 
plane, the common direction of their motions around the sun, 
the approximation of the planes and the directions of their 
rotations to the planes of their orbits and the directions of 
their revolutions, the approximative^ regular distribution of 
their distances from the sun, the relations of their satellites to 
the general features of the primary system, — these are some 



6 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

of the facts requiring explanations of the kind which a geolo* 
gist or a naturalist would give of the distribution of minerals, 
or stratifications in the crust of the earth, or of the distribution 
of plants and animals upon its surfa ce, — phenomena indicating 
complex antecedent conditions, in which the evidence of law is 
more or less distinct. The absence of that perfection in the solar 
system, of that unblemished completeness, which the ancient 
astronomy assumed and taught, and the presence, at the same 
time, of an apparently imperfect regularity, compel us to re- 
gard the constitution of the solar system as a secondary and 
derived product of complicated operations, instead of an 
archetypal and pure creation. 

Such is one of the grounds on which the nebular hypothesis 
rests. The other is of a more general character. The ante- 
cedent probability which the theory lacks, from its inability to 
prove by independent evidence the fundamental assumption 
of a nebulous matter, is partially supplied by a still more gen- 
eral hypothesis, to which this theory may be regarded as in 
some sort a corollary. We refer lo the "development hypoth- 
esis," or "theory of evolution," — a generalization from cer- 
tain biological phenomena, which has latterly attracted great 
attention from speculative naturalists. This hypothesis has 
been less fortunate in its history than that of the astronomical 
one. Inveterate prejudices, insoluble associations of ideas, a 
want of preparation in the habits of the imagination, were 
the unscientific obstacles to a general and ready acceptance 
of this hypothesis at its first promulgation. Though in one 
of its applications it is identical with the nebular hypothesis, 
yet, in more direct application to the phenomena of the gen- 
eral life on the earth's surface, it appears so improbable, that 
it has hitherto failed to gain the favor which the nebular hy- 
pothesis enjoys. Nevertheless, as a general conception, and 
independently of its specific use in scientific theories, it has 
much to recommend it to the speculative mind. It is, as it 
were, an abstract statement of the order which the intellect 
expects to find in the phenomena of nature. "Evolution," 
or the progress "from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous, 
and from the simple to the complex," is the order of the prog- 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE, j 

ress of knowledge itself, and is, therefore, naturally enough, 
sought for as the order in time of all natural phenomena. The 
specific natural phenomena in which the law of "evolution" 
is determined by observation as a real and established law, are 
the phenomena of the growth of the individual organism, ani- 
mal or plant. As a law of psychological phenomena, and even 
of certain elements of social and historical phenomena, it is 
also well established. Its extension to the phenomena of the 
life of the races of organized beings, and to the successions of 
life on the surface of the earth, is still a speculative conclusion, 
with about the same degree of scientific probability that the 
nebular hypothesis possesses. And lastly, in the form of the 
nebular hypothesis itself, it is extended so as to include the 
whole series of the phenomena of the universe, and is thus in 
generality, if accepted as a law of nature, superior to any 
other generalization in the history of philosophy. 

As included in this grander generalization, the nebular hy- 
pothesis receives a very important accession of probability, 
provided that this generalization can be regarded as otherwise 
well founded. As a part of the induction by which this gen- 
eralization must be established, if it be capable of proof, the 
nebular hypothesis acquires a new and important interest. 

We are far from being convinced, however, that further in- 
quiry will succeed in establishing so interesting a conclusion. 
We strongly suspect that the law of "evolution" will fail to 
appear in phenomena not connected, either directly or re- 
motely, with the life of the individual organism, of the growth 
of which this law is an abstract description. And, heterodox 
though the opinion be, we are inclined to accept as the sound- 
est and most catholic assumption, on grounds of scientific 
method, the too little regarded doctrine of Aristotle, which 
banishes cosmology from the realm of scientific inquiry, re- 
ducing natural phenomena in their cosmical relations to an 
infinite variety of manifestations (without a discoverable tend- 
ency on the whole) of causes and laws which are simple and 
constant in their ultimate elements.* 

* The laws or archetypes of nature are properly the laws of invariable or unconditional 
sequence in natural operations. And it is only with the objective relations of these laws, 



8 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

In rejecting the essential doctrine of " the theory of evolu- 
tion " or "the development hypothesis," we must reserve an 
important conclusion implied in the doctrine, which we think 
is its strongest point. There are several large classes of facts, 
apparently ultimate and unaccountable, which still bear the 
marks of being the consequences of the operations of so-called 
secondary causes, — in other words, have the same general 
character as phenomena which are known to be the results 
of mixed and conflicting causes, or exhibit at the same time 
evidence of law and appearance of accident. That such facts 
should be regarded as evidence of natural operations still un- 
known, and perhaps unsuspected, is, we think, a legitimate 
conclusion, and one which is presupposed in "the theory of 
evolution," and in the nebular hypothesis, but does not ne- 
cessitate the characteristic assumptions of these speculations. 
An extension of the sphere of secondary causes, even to the 
explanation of all the forms of the universe as it now exists, or 
of all the forms which we may conceive ever to have existed, 
is a very different thing from adopting the cosmological doc- 
trine of the "development theory." Naturalists who have 
recently become convinced of the necessity of extending nat- 
ural explanations to facts in biology hitherto regarded as ulti- 
mate and inexplicable, but who are unwilling to adopt the 
cosmological view implied in the "development theory," have 
adopted a new name to designate their views. "The deriva- 
tive theory," or "derivative hypothesis," implies only con- 
tinuity, not growth or progress, in the succession of races on 
the surface of the earth. Progress may have been made, as a 
matter of fact, and the evidence of it may be very conclusive 
in the geological record; but the fact may still be of secondary 
importance in the cosmological relations of the phenomena, 
and the theory ought not, therefore, to give the fact too prom- 
inent a place in its nomenclature. 

as constituting the order of nature, that natural science is concerned. Their subjective 
relations, origin, and essential being belong to the province of transcendental meta- 
physics, and to a philosophy of faith. According to this division, there can never arise 
any < onflict between science and faith ; for what the one is competent to declare, the 
other is incompetent to dispute. Science should be free to determine what the order of 
nature is, and faith equally free to declare the essential nature of causation or creation. 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. g 

That the constitution of the solar system is not archetypal, 
as the ancients supposed, but the same corrupt mixture of law 
and apparent accident that the phenomena of the earth's sur- 
face exhibit, is evidence enough that this system is a natural 
product ;* and the nebular hypothesis, so far as it is concerned 
with the explanation simply of the production of this system, 
and independently of its cosmological import, may be regarded 
as a legitimate theory, even on the ground we have assumed, 
though on this ground the most probable hypothesis would 
assimilate the causes which produced the solar system more 
nearly to the character of ordinary natural operations than 
the nebular hypothesis does. With a view to such assimilation, 
and in opposition to "the theory of evolution" as a general- 
ization from the phenomena of growth, we will now propose 
another generalization, which we cannot but regard as better 
founded in the laws of nature. We may call it the principle 
of counter-movements, — a principle in accordance with which 
there is no action in nature to which there is not some counter- 
action, and no production in nature from which in infinite ages 
there can result an infinite product. In biological phenomena 
this principle is familiarly illustrated by the counter-play of the 
forces of life and death, of nutrition and waste, of growth and 
degeneration, and of similar opposite effects. In geology the 
movements of the materials of the earth's crust through the 
counteractions of the forces by which the strata are elevated 

* This argument for physical causes is apparently the reverse of that which Laplace 
derived from the regularities of the solar system and the theory of probabilities ; but in 
reality the objects of the two arguments are distinct. For the legitimate conclusion 
from Laplace's computation is, not that the solar system is simply a physical product, 
but that the causes of its production could not have been irregular. The result of this 
computation was a probability of two hundred thousand billions to one that the regular- 
ities of the solar system aro not the effects of chance or irregular causes. 

The gist of this argument is to prove simplicity in the antecedents of the solar sys- 
tem ; and, had the proportion been still greater, or infinity to one, the argument might 
have proved a primitive or archetypal character in-the movements of this system. It is 
therefore in the limitations, and not in the magnitude, of this proportion, that there is 
any tendency to show physical antecedence. Hence it is not from the regularities of 
the solar system, but from its complexity, that its physical origin is justly inferred. 

Regarding the law of 'causation as universal, since, if not implied in the very search 
for causes, it is at least the broadest and the best established induction from natural 
phenomena, we conclude that the appearance of accident among the manifestations of 
law is proof of the existence of complex antecedent conditions and of physical causa- 
tion, and that the absence of this appearance is proof of simple and primitive law.' 



IO PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

and denuded, depressed and deposited, ground to mud or 
hardened to rock, are all of the compensative sort ; and the 
movements of the gaseous and liquid oceans which surround 
the earth manifest still more markedly the principle of counter- 
movements in the familiar phenomena of the weather. 

Of what we may call cosmical weather, in the interstellar 
spaces, little is known. Of the general cosmical effects of the 
opposing actions of heat and gravitation, the great dispersive 
and concentrative principles of the universe, we can at present 
only form vague conjectures; but that these two principles are 
the agents of vast counter-movements in the formation and 
destruction^ of systems of worlds, always operative in never- 
ending cycles and in infinite time, seems to us to be by far 
the most rational supposition which we can form concerning 
the matter. And indeed, in one form or another, the agencies 
of heat and gravitation must furnish the explanations of the 
circumstances and the peculiarities of solar and sidereal sys- 
tems. These are the agents which the nebular hypothesis 
supposes; but by this hypothesis they are supposed to act 
under conditions opposed to that general analogy of natural 
operations expressed by the law of counter-movements. Their 
relative actions are regarded as directed, under certain condi- 
tions, toward a certain definite result; and this being attained, 
their formative agency is supposed to cease, the system to be 
finished, and the creation, though a continuous process, to be 
a limited one. 

It should be noticed, however, in favor of the nebular 
hypothesis, that its assumptions are made, not arbitrarily, in 
opposition to the general analogy of natural operations, but 
because they furnish at once and very simply certain mechan- 
ical conditions from which systems analogous to the solar 
system may be shown to be derivable. The dispersive agency 
of heat is supposed to furnish the primordial conditions, upon 
which, as the heat is gradually lost from the clouds of nebulous 
matter, the agency of gravitation produces the condensations, 
the motions, and the disruptions of the masses which subse- 
quently become suns and planets and satellites. And if the 
mechanical conditions assumed in this hypothesis could be 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. It 

shown to be the only ones by which similar effects could be 
produced, the hypothesis would, without doubt, acquire a 
degree of probability amounting almost to certainty, even in 
spite of the absence of independent proof that matter has 
ever existed in the nebulous form. 

But the mechanical conditions of the problem have never 
been determined in this exhaustive manner, nor are the con- 
ditions assumed in the nebular hypothesis able to determine 
any other than the general circumstances of the solar system, 
such as it is supposed to have in common with similar systems 
among the stars. A more detailed deduction would probably 
require as many separate, arbitrary, and additional hypotheses 
as there are special circumstances to be accounted for. Until, 
therefore, it can be shown that the nebular hypothesis is the 
only one which can account mechanically for the agency of 
heat and gravitation in the formation of special systems of 
worlds, like the solar system, its special cosmological and me- 
chanical features ought to be regarded with suspicions, as 
opposed to the general analogy of natural operations. 

We propose to criticise this hypothesis more in detail, and 
to indicate briefly the direction in which we believe a better 
solution of the problem of the construction of the solar system 
will be found. But before proceeding, we must notice an able 
Essay, by Mr. Herbert Spencer, the first in his Second Series 
of " Essays : Scientific, Political, and Speculative." 

In this essay on the "Nebular Hypothesis,',' and in the fol- 
lowing one on " Illogical Geology," Mr. Spencer has attempted 
the beginning of that inductive proof of the general theory of 
"evolution" to which we have referred. Undoubtedly the 
clearest and the ablest of the champions and expounders of this 
theory, he brings to its illustration and defense an extraordi- 
nary sagacity, and an aptitude for dealing with scientific facts 
at second hand, and in their broad general relations, such as 
few discoverers and adepts in natural science have ever exhib- 
ited. For dealing with facts which are matters of common 
observation, his powers are those of true genius. In the essays 
following those with which we are immediately interested, and 
particularly in the essay on "The Physiology of Laughter," 



I2 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

and in the review of Mr. Bain's work on "The Emotions and 
the Will," he displays the true scope of his genius. In psy- 
chology, and in the physiology of familiar facts, we regard his 
contributions to philosophy as of real and lasting value. He is 
deficient, however, in that technical knowledge which is neces- 
sary to a correct apprehension of the obscure facts of science; 
and his generalizations upon them do not impress us as so 
well founded as they are ingenious. 

In his resume of the facts favorable to the nebular hypoth- 
esis, he has committed sundry errors of minor importance, 
which do not in themselves materially affect the credibility 
of the hypothesis, but illustrate the extremely loose and un- 
certain character of the general arguments in its support. A 
singular use is made of a table, compiled by Arago, of the 
inclinations of the planes of the orbits of the comets. The 
legitimate inference from this table is, that there is a well- 
marked accumulation of the planes of these orbits at small 
inclinations to the plane of the ecliptic. In considering the 
directions of the poles of these planes, we ought to find them 
equally distributed to all parts of the heavens, in case the 
orbits of the comets bear no relation to those of the planets 
or to each other. Instead of this, we find a marked concen- 
tration of these poles about the pole of the ecliptic, showing 
that their planes tend decidedly to coincide with the ecliptic. 
But Mr. Spencer has drawn from this table a conclusion 
directly the reverse of this. Assuming, as we cannot but 
believe on insufficient evidence, that the directions of the 
major axes of the orbits of those comets whose planes are 
greatly inclined to the ecliptic have nearly as great an inclina- 
tion as they can have, or that they are nearly as much inclined 
to the ecliptic as the planes of the orbits themselves, he regards 
the table of the inclinations of the planes of the orbits as indi- 
cating, at least for such comets, the directions of their axes, 
and draws thence the conclusion, that there is a well-marked 
concentration about the pole of the directions of the axes of 
the cometary orbits, and hence, that the regions in which the 
aphelia of comets are most numerous are above and below the 
sun, in directions nearly perpendicular to the ecliptic. This 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. 



!3 



conclusion, though the reverse of that which is legitimately 
drawn from Arago's table, is not inconsistent with it; and if 
Mr. Spencer were correct in his assumption concerning the 
directions of the axes of highly inclined orbits, the table would 
show that there are really two well-distinguished systems of 
comets, the one belonging to the general planetary system, 
and the other, Mr. Spencer's, forming a system by itself, — an 
axial one, at right angles with the general system. 

But either conclusion serves the purpose of the discussion 
equally well. For what Mr. Spencer wished to show was, that 
the relations of the comets to the solar system are not utterly 
fortuitous and irregular, but such as indicate a systematic con- 
nection; and this is undoubtedly true, since the connection of 
the planetary and cometary orbits is even more direct and inti- 
mate than Mr. Spencer has suspected. The inference which 
Arago's table warrants is, then, another in that interesting 
series of facts which some physical theory, whether nebular 
or not, by "evolution" or by involution, may some day ex- 
plain. 

The greater number of the arguments, old and new, which 
Mr. Spencer adduces in support of his thesis, do not apply 
specifically to the nebular hypothesis in particular, but are 
simply an enumeration of the facts which go to show the ex- 
istence of physical connections, of an unknown origin and 
species, in the solar system. In his handling of the me- 
chanical problems of the nebular genesis, Mr. Spencer has 
succeeded no better than his predecessors. In attempting to 
account for the exceptions to a general law which the rota- 
tions of the outer planets, Uranus and Neptune, and the revo- 
lutions of their satellites, exhibit, — the great inclinations of 
the planes of these rotations and revolutions to the planes 
of the orbits of the primaries,— Air. Spencer makes what 
appears to us a very erroneous assumption, and one from 
which the conclusion he wishes to draw by no means inevi- 
tably follows. 

It is one of the few successes of the nebular hypothesis, that 
it accounts in a general way for the fact that the planes and 
directions of the rotations of the planets, and the revolutions 



I 4 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

of their satellites, nearly coincide with the planes and direc- 
tions of their own orbital motions. A ring of nebulous matter, 
detached by its centrifugal force from the revolving mass of 
the nebula, contains within it the conditions by which the 
direction, and even the amount, of the rotation of the result- 
ing planet is determined; and this direction is the same as 
that of the revolution of the ring. The ring must originally 
be of a very thin, quoit-shaped form, even if it be composed 
of separate, independently moving parts ; otherwise the planes 
of the orbits of the several parts would not pass through or 
near to the centre of attraction in the central nebula, and the 
parts must either pass through each other from one to the 
other surface of the ring, which would tend, along with other 
forces, to flatten it to the requisite thinness. Hence, a hoop- 
shaped fluid ring, or one thinner in the directions of its radii 
than in a direction perpendicular to its general plane, could 
not exist. Much less could such a ring be detached by its 
self-sustaining centrifugal force from the body of the nebula. 
The nebula must necessarily be flattened in its equatorial 
regions to a sharp, thin edge by the centrifugal force of its 
revolution, before those regions could be separated to form a 
ring. The supposition, therefore, which Mr. Spencer's inge- 
nuity has devised to account for the anomalies presented in 
the rotations and the secondary systems of Uranus and Nep- 
tune, — a hoop-shaped ring, with a less determinate tendency 
to rotation in forming a planet, — is untenable. But this is 
not all. Supposing such a form possible, and even if the parts 
of the ring did not move among themselves, or press upon 
one another so as to flatten the ring, yet the direction of its 
tendency to rotation in contracting to a planet is just as deter- 
minate as in the quoit-shaped ring. 

We have gone thus into detail, to show the vague and 
uncertain character of the mechanical arguments of the neb- 
ular hypothesis when they deal with details in the constitution 
of the solar system. In his treatment of recent discoveries 
and views in stellar astronomy, we think Mr. Spencer more 
fortunate. We agree with him in believing the current opin- 
ion to be an error, which represents the nebulae as isolated 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. 



IS 



sidereal systems, inconceivably remote, and with magnitudes 
commensurate with the Galactic system itself. There are many 
reasons for believing that the nebulas belong to this system, 
and that they are, in general, at no greater distance from us 
than the stars themselves. We think, also, with him, that the 
actual magnitudes of the stars are probably of all degrees, 
and that their apparent magnitudes do not generally indicate 
their relative distances from us. We would even go further, 
and maintain, as both a priori most probable, and most in 
accordance with observation, that the free bodies of the uni- 
verse range in size from a grain of dust to masses many times 
larger than the sun, and that the number of bodies of any 
magnitude is likely to bear some simple proportion to the 
smallness of this magnitude, itself. Star-dust is not at all 
distasteful to us, except in the form of nebular boluses. For 
reasons which will appear hereafter, the smaller bodies are 
not likely to be self-luminous; and star-dust is probably the 
cause of more obscuration than light in the stellar universe. 
That gaseous and liquid masses also exist with all degrees of 
rarefaction or density, dependent on the actions of heat and 
gravitation, is also, we think, very probable; and the three 
states of aggregation in matter doubtless play important parts 
in the cosmical economy. 

Before leaving Mr. Spencer, to attend more immediately to 
the merits of the nebular hypothesis, we wish to adopt from 
him an estimate of the value of certain ideas in geology, the 
bearing of which on our subject is not so remote as it may at 
first sight appear to be. 

Geology has not yet so far detached itself from cosmological 
speculations as to be entitled to the rank of a strictly positive 
science. The influence of such speculations upon its termi- 
nology, and upon the forms of the questions and the directions 
of the researches of its cultivators, is still very noticeable, and 
shows how difficult it is to start anew in the prosecution of 
physical inquiries, or completely to discard unfounded opin- 
ions which have for a long time prevailed. Greater sagacity 
is sometimes required to frame wise questions, than to find 
their answers. Geologists still continue to collate remote strati- 



1 6 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

fications as to their stratigraphical order, mineral composition, 
and fossil remains, as if these were still expected to disclose a 
comparatively simple history — simple at least in its outlines 
— of the changes which the life of our globe has undergone. 
A story, dramatically complete from prologue to epilogue, was 
demanded in the cosmological childhood of the science, and 
its manhood still searches in the fragmentary and mutilated 
records for the history of the creation. But doubtless the story 
is as deficient in the dramatic unities, as the record itself is 
in continuity or completeness. Referring to Mr. Spencer's 
admirable essay on "Illogical Geology" for our reasons, we 
will simply state our belief that nothing in the form of a 
complete or connected history will ever be deciphered from 
the geological record. 

" Only the last chapter of the earth's history has come down to us. 
The many previous chapters, stretching back to a time immeasurably 
remote, have been burnt, and with them all the records of life we may 
presume they contained. The greater part of the evidence which might 
have served to settle the development controversy is forever lost ; and on 
neither side can the arguments derived from geology be conclusive." 

We must not ascribe to Mr. Spencer, however, our opinion, 
that, even if this record were more complete, we should not 
necessarily be the wiser for it. According to Mr. Spencer's 
views, the first strata, had they been preserved, would have 
contained the remains of protozoa and protophytes ; but, for 
aught we dare guess, they might have contained the footprint: 
of archangels. 

Evidence of progress in life through any ever so consider- 
able portion of the earth's stratified materials would not, in 
our opinion, warrant us in drawing universal cosmical con- 
clusions therefrom. Alternations of progress and regress rela- 
tively to any standard of ends or excellence which we might 
apply, is to us the most probable hypothesis that the general 
analogy of natural operations warrants. Nevertheless, as we 
have already intimated, we accept the purely physical portion 
of the "development hypothesis," both in its astronomical and 
biological applications, but would much prefer to designate the 
doctrine in both its applications by the name we have already 
quoted. This name, "the derivative hypothesis," simply con- 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. jj 

notes the fact that, in several classes of phenomena hitherto 
regarded as ultimate and inexplicable, physical explanations 
are probable and legitimate. But it makes no claim to rank 
with the names of the Muses as a revealer of the cosmical order 
and the beginning of things. 

We are aware that in thus summarily rejecting the cosmo- 
logical import of the nebular hypothesis, along with its special 
physical assumptions, and retaining only its fundamental as- 
sumption, that the solar system is a natural product, we leave 
no provision to meet a demand which we allow, and we ought 
to justify this insolvency by proving the bankruptcy of the 
hypothesis whose debts we thus assume. It would be difficult, 
however, to prove that this hypothesis cannot fulfill the promise 
it has so long held out. Much more difficult would it be to 
supply its place with an equally plausible theory. But our ob- 
ject should not be to satisfy the imagination with plausibility. 
If we succeed in satisfying our understanding with the outlines 
of a theory sufficiently probable, we shall have done all that 
in the present state of our knowledge can reasonably be de- 
manded. 

The agencies of heat and gravitation acting, however slowly, 
through the ages of limitless time, and according to the law of 
counter-movements, or according to the analogy of the weather, 
constitute the means and the general mode of operation 
from which we anticipate an explanation of the general consti- 
tutions of solar and sidereal systems. 

There comes to our aid a remarkable series of speculations 
and experiments recently promulgated upon the general sub- 
ject of the nature and origin of heat, and under the general 
name of " The Dynamical Theory of Heat," the principles of 
which we shall endeavor briefly to explain. It is a funda- 
mental theorem in mechanical philosophy, that no motion can 
be destroyed, except by the production of other equivalent mo- 
tions, or by an equivalent change in the antecedent conditions 
ot motion. If we launch a projectile upward, the motion 
which we impart to it is not a new creation, but is derived 
from forces or antecedent conditions of motion of a very com- 
plicated character in our muscular organism. It would be 



T 8 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS, 

confusing to consider these at the outset; but if we look simply 
to the motion thus produced in the projectile itself, we shall 
gain the best preliminary notions as to the character of the 
phenomena of motion in general. The projectile rises to a 
certain height and comes to rest, and then, unless caught upon 
some elevated support, like the roof of a house, it returns to 
the ground with constantly accelerated motion, till it is sud- 
denly brought to rest by collision with the earth. In this 
series of phenomena we have in reality only a series of com- 
mutations of motions and conditions of motion. The project- 
ile is brought to rest at its greatest elevation by two forms of 
commutation. A small part of its motion is given to the air, 
and the remainder is transformed into the new condition of 
motion represented by its elevated position. The latter may 
remain for a long time permanent in case the projectile is 
caught at -its greatest elevation upon some support. But a 
small auxiliary movement dislodging the projectile may at any 
time develop this condition of motion into a movement nearly 
equal to that which the projectile first received from our mus- 
cles. The small part that is lost in the air or other obstacles 
still exists, either in some form of motion or in some new con- 
ditions of motion, and the much greater part which disap- 
pears in the collision of the projectile with the earth is con- 
verted into several kinds of vibratory molecular movements 
in the earth, in the air, and in the projectile itself; and per- 
haps in part also in various new molecular conditions of mo- 
tion. 

If we designate by the word "power" that in which all forms 
of motion or antecedent conditions of motion are equivalent, 
we find that in the operations of nature no "power" is ever 
lost. Nor is there any evidence that any new "power" is 
ever created. It would be foreign to our purpose to follow 
into their ramifications the speculations by which this interest- 
ing theorem has been illustrated in many branches of physical 
inquiry. We are immediately interested only in the three 
principal and most general manifestations of "power" in the 
universe, namely, the movements of bodies, the movements in 
bodies, and the general antecedent conditions of both. 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. I9 

The proposition that the principal molecular motions in 
bodies are the cause which produces in our nerves the sensa- 
tions of heat, or that they are what we denominate " the sub- 
stance of heat," — the objective cause of these sensations, — 
has long been held as a very probable hypothesis; and has 
latterly received experimental confirmations amounting to 
complete proof. The three principal manifestations of 
"power" in the universe are then, more specifically, the. mass- 
ive motions of bodies in translation and rotation, their molecu- 
lar motions, or heat ; and the principal antecedent condition 
of both, or gravitation. 

In comparing these as to their equivalence we obtain a sum 
of "power," which remains invariable and indestructible by 
the operations of nature. It remains to determine the precise 
relations of their equivalence, and what the operations are by 
which they are converted into each other. 

The mechanical equivalent of heat is a quantity which has 
been very accurately determined by experiment. By means 
of it we may very readily compute what amount of heat would 
be produced if a given amount of massive motion were con- 
verted into heat by friction or otherwise ; or conversely, what 
amount of massive motion could be produced by the conver- 
sion of a given amount of heat into mechanical effect ; but it 
is unnecessary to our purpose to give the precise method of 
this computation. 

The mechanical equivalent of gravitation is another quantity 
or relation depending on the changes of what is called the 
"potential" of gravitation, or the sum of the ratios of the 
masses to the distances apart of the gravitating bodies. The 
"power" of motion is a relation or quantity, commonly called 
the "living force " of motion, and depends on the mass and on 
the square of the velocity of the moving body. 

The living forces of all moving bodies, minus the potentials 
of their forces of gravitation, plus the mechanical values of 
their heat, equal to a constant quantity, — is the precise 
formula to which our cosmical speculations should conform. 
It will be impossible, however, to make any other than a very 
general use of this precise law. What concerns us more 



2 o PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

nearly is the consideration of the natural operations by which 
these manifestations of "power" are converted into each 
other. 

. The origin of the sun's light and heat is a problem upon 
which speculative ingenuity has long been expended in vain. 
The metaphysical conclusion, that the sun is composed of pure 
fire, or of fire per se, the very essence of fire, is one of many 
illustrations of the ingenious way in which speculation covers 
its nakedness with words, and can really mean, we imagine, 
only that the. sun is very hot. That the sun, like any other 
body, must grow cooler by the expenditure of heat, is without 
doubt an indisputable proposition; and the question, how this 
heat is restored to it, is thus a legitimate one. The nebular 
hypothesis explains how the primitive heat in the sun and in 
other bodies could be generated by the condensation of the 
original nebulous mass, in which the heat is supposed to have 
been originally diffused ; but it affords no explanation of the 
manner in which this heat could be sustained through the ages 
that must have elapsed since the nebular genesis must have 
been completed. 

There are no precise means of estimating the amount of 
heat contained in the sun, since the capacity for heat of the 
materials which compose it are unknown ; but from general 
analogy it may safely be assumed that the sun must grow 
cooler at a sensible rate, unless its heat is in some way re- 
newed. Concerning the rate of its expenditure of heat, and 
the means which the dynamical theory of heat proposes to 
supply the loss, we will quote from the interesting lectures 
of Professor Tyndall, "On Heat considered as a Mode of 
Motion." 

"The researches of Sir J. Herschel and M. Pouillet have informed ns 
of the annual expenditure of the sun as regards heat, and by an easy 
calculation we ascertain the precise amount of the expenditure which 
falls to the share of our planet. Out of 2,300 million parts of light and 
heat the earth receives one. The whole heat emitted by the sun in a 
minute would be competent to boil 12,000 millions of cubic miles of ice- 
cold water. How is this enormous loss made good ? Whence is the 
sun's heat derived, and by what means is it maintained ? No combustion, 
no chemical affinity with which we are acquainted, would be competent 
to produce the temperature of the sun's surface. Besides, were the sun 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. 2 \ 

a burning body merely, its light and heat would assuredly speedily come 
to an end. Supposing it to be a solid globe of coal, its combustion would 
only cover 4,600 years of expenditure. In this short time it would burn 
itself out. What agency, then, can produce the temperature and maintain 
the outlay ? We have already regarded the case of a body falling from a 
great distance towards the earth, and found that the heat generated by its 
collision would be twice that produced by the combustion of an equal 
weight of coal. How much greater must be the heat developed by a body 
falling towards the sun ! The maximum velocity with which a body can 
strike the earth [arising from the earth's attraction] is about 7 miles a 
second ; the maximum velocity with which it can strike the sun is 390 
miles a second. And as the heat developed by the collision is proportional 
to the square of the velocity destroyed, an asteroid falling into the sun 
with the above velocity would generate about 10,000 times the quantity 
of heat generated by the combustion of an asteroid of coal of the same 
weight. 

"Have we any reason to believe that such bodies exist in space, and 
that they may be rained down upon the sun ? The meteorites flashing 
through our air are small planetary bodies, drawn by the earth's attrac- 
tion, and entering our atmosphere with planetary velocity. By friction 
against the air they are raised to incandescence, and caused to emit light 
and heat. At certain seasons of the year they shower down upon us 
in great numbers. In Boston [England] 240,000 of them were ob- 
served in nine hours. There is no reason to suppose that the planetary 
system is limited to vast masses of enormous weight ; there is every 
reason to believe that space is stocked with smaller masses, which obey 
the same laws as the large ones. That lenticular envelope which sur- 
rounds the sun, and which is known to astronomers as the zodiacal 
light, is probably a crowd of meteors ; and, moving as they do in a 
resisting medium, they must continually approach the sun. Falling into 
it, they would be competent to produce the heat observed, and this Would 
constitute a source from which the annual loss of heat would be made 
good. The sun, according to this hypothesis, would be continually grow- 
ing larger ; but how much larger ? Were our moon to fall into the sun, 
it would develop an amount of heat sufficient to cover one or two years' 
loss ; and were our earth to fall into the sun, a century's loss would be 
made good. Still, our moon and our earth, if distributed over the surface 
of the sun, would utterly vanish from perception. Indeed, the quantity 
of matter competent to produce the necessary effect would, during the 
range of history, produce no appreciable augmentation of the sun's magni- 
tude. The augmentation of the sun's attractive force would be more ap- 
preciable. However this hypothesis may fare as a representant of what is 
going on in nature, it certainly shows how a sun might be formed and 
maintained by the application of known thermo-dynamic principles." * 



Appendix to Lecture XII. p. 455. 



22 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

This part of our inquiry — how gravitation and motion are 
converted into heat — is receiving the amplest illustration and 
discussion from physicists at the present time ; and, though the 
somewhat startling conclusions we have quoted are still too 
new to be generally credited, they are too well founded in ex- 
periment and the general analogies of natural phenomena to 
be passed lightly by. 

The second part of our inquiry — how heat is refunded, in 
the eternal round of cosmical phenomena, into the antecedent 
conditions of motion, or to the conditions which preceded the 
production of the motions that are converted into heat — is 
a subject to which physicists have given little attention. In- 
deed, the cosmological ideas which prevail in geological inqui- 
ries beset this subject also, and impede inquiry. The order 
of nature is almost universally regarded as a progression from 
a determinate beginning to a determinate conclusion.* The 
dynamical theory of heat lengthens out the process better, 
perhaps, than the nebular hypothesis alone; but both leave 
the universe at length in a hopeless chaos of huge, dark 
masses, — ruined suns wandering in eternal night. 

It seems not to have occurred to physicists to inquire what 
becomes of the heat the generation of which requires so great 
an expenditure of motion. The heat is, in another form, the 
same motion as that which is lost by the fallen bodies. It is 
radiated into space, while the bodies remain in the sun ; but 
this radiation is still the same motion in other bodies, in the 
luminiferous ether, or in the diffused matters of space. It can- 
not be lost from the universe, and must either accumulate in 
diffused materials or be converted into other motions or into 
new conditions of motion. But if the solid bodies of the uni- 
verse are gradually collected at certain centres, and their mo- 
tions are diffused in the form of heat throughout the gaseous 
materials of space, what do we gain ? How do we by such a 
conclusion avoid the ultimate catastrophe which we regard as 
the reductio ad absurdum of a scientific theory ? How do we 
thereby constitute that cycle of movements which we regard 
as characteristic of all natural phenomena ? Perhaps we have 
been somewhat too hasty in adopting the conclusion that the 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. 23 

fallen bodies must necessarily remain in the sun, and grad 
ually augment its mass. Let us, therefore, examine this point 
more closely. 

The principles of the steam-engine afford a clew to the 
converse process we are in search of, by which heat may be 
refunded into mechanical effects and conditions. The mechan- 
ical effects of the expanding power of steam are only partially 
developed in the work which the engine performs. This work, 
converted back to heat by friction or otherwise, would be in- 
sufficient to reproduce the same effects in the form of steam. 
The remaining power consists in the motions and the power 
of expansion with which the steam escapes from the engine. 
This is lost power ; but if it should be allowed to develop itself 
by an expansion of the steam into an indefinitely extended 
vacuum, the molecular motions of the particles of the steam 
would gradually, and on the outside of the expanding vapor- 
ous mass, be converted into velocities or massive motions ; the 
vapor itself would be converted back into water, or even be 
frozen into snow, and the particles of this water or snow would, 
at the top of the expanding cloud, finally come to rest by the 
force of gravitation. A part, therefore, of the lost power of 
the heat which escaped in steam would be converted into that 
antecedent condition of motion represented by elevation above 
the attracting mass of the earth or by gravitation ; a part would 
continue to manifest itself as velocity or massive motion ; and 
the remainder would still continue to exert an outward press- 
ure in the form of heat in vapor. This development would 
continue so long as the steam continued to discharge itself into 
the indefinitely extended vacuum we have supposed. The 
rain or snow falling from the top of the cloud would convert 
its gravitative power back again into motion, which, again 
arrested by collision with the earth, would suffer other trans- 
formations in the endless round. In the actual case, where 
the steam escapes into the air instead of a vacuum, the phe- 
nomena would be less simple. The history of its heat would 
become involved with the grander phenomena of the weather, 
— phenomena that may be regarded as typical of that cosmical 
weather, concerning the laws of which we must inquire in con- 
sidering what becomes of the sun's heat. 



2 4 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



This heat is capable, provided it could all be so expended, 
of lifting the amount of matter which, by falling into the sun, 
is supposed to produce it, to the same height from the sun as 
that from which the fallen bodies may be supposed to have 
descended. This follows from the general mechanical princi- 
ples we have stated. But how is this lifting effected ? What 
is the Titanic machinery by which the sun performs this labor ? 
The velocity with which a body falling from the interstellar 
spaces enters the body of the sun is sufficient, when converted 
to heat by friction and the shock, to convert the body itself 
into vapor, even if the body be composed of the least fusible 
of materials. The heat thus produced is not, however, con- 
fined to the fallen matter. A large portion is imparted to the 
matter already in the sun ; but parts, no doubt, both of the 
projectile and of the resisting material are vaporized. The 
atmosphere immediately surrounding the sun contains the va- 
pors of many of the most refractory metals that are known, 
as we learn from that wonderful instrument, the spectroscope. 
And this is made evident by the absorption from the sun's 
luminous rays of certain portions characteristic of these metals. 
Doubtless, in absorbing their characteristic vibrations, these 
metals are further heated and expanded, and gradually lifted 
from the surface of the sun ; and the vibrations of light and 
heat that pass through them and escape are probably all ulti- 
mately absorbed in the same or some similar way in the dif- 
fused materials of space. The speculations of the elder Struve 
on the extinction of light in its passage through space — con- 
clusions founded on Sir William Herschel's observations of 
the Milky-Way — afford a happy and independent confirmation 
of these views. Moreover, the spectroscopic analyses of the 
light of the stars show broad dark bands, indicative of great 
extinctions of light. And we may add, that many gases and 
vapors which are transparent to luminous rays are found to 
absorb the obscure rays of heat. 

Such is the kind of evidence we have of what becomes of the 
light and heat, and a portion, at least, of the material of the 
sun. The heat which is not expended immediately in vapor- 
izing these materials is ultimately extinguished in further heat- 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. 25 

ing, expanding, and thus lifting the materials (may we not be- 
lieve ?) which have already been partially raised to the height, 
whence perhaps, in former ages, they in their turn were rained 
down as meteors upon the sun. In these suppositions we have 
exactly reversed the nebular hypothesis. Instead of, in former 
ages, a huge gaseous globe contracted by cooling and by gravi- 
tation, and consolidated at its centre, we have supposed one 
now existing, and filling that portion of the interstellar spaces 
over which the sun's attraction predominates, — a highly rarefied 
continuous gaseous mass, constantly evaporated and expanded 
from its solid centre, but constantly condensed and consoli- 
dated near its outer limits, — constantly heated at its centre 
by the fall of solid bodies from its outer limits, and constantly 
cooled and condensed at these limits by the conversion of heat 
into motion and the arrest of this motion by gravitation. 

There are certain chemical objections which apply equally 
to the views here advanced and to the nebular hypothesis. 
But these must necessarily arise from the limits' to the knowl- 
edge we can gain of the whole range of chemical phenomena. 
For what takes place in the chemist's laboratory, under the 
very limited conditions of temperature and pressure he can 
command, ought not to be regarded as determining the possi- 
bilities, or even the probabilities, of that cosmical chemistry of 
which we can hardly be supposed to know even the rudiments. 
We shall consider this subject, however, more particularly, 
after attending to what is now of more immediate interest, 
namely, the secondary mechanical conditions and phenomena 
that result from the suppositions we have made ; and particu- 
larly the question, how the systems of the planets and their 
satellites stand related to the round of changes we have con- 
sidered. 

The fundamental and most important motions of the solar 
system are, as we suppose, the radial movements of solid bodies 
inward and of gaseous bodies outward, arising from the coun- 
teractions of gravitation and heat. But these radial move- 
ments must assume a vortical form, if one does not already 
exist, such as is constantly exhibited by movements in the air 
and in water. The rotation of the sun, imparted to the mate- 
2 



26 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

rials which rise in vapor from its surface, continues in them 
as they rise higher and higher, and though exhibited in a con- 
stantly diminishing tangential motion, remains in reality con- 
stant, as measured by what mechanicians term "rotation area." 
Or, rather, it is slowly increased by the mutual resistances of 
contiguous strata in the expanding gases, so that when this 
matter falls again towards the sun in the form of solid bodies, 
it falls in spiral trajectories, and only reaches the sun after 
perhaps many revolutions, or not at all, unless its motions be 
rapidly diminished by the resisting medium. If the resistance 
of the medium is not sufficient to convert the path of a falling 
meteor into a spiral, the meteor will mount again, and con- 
tinue to move perhaps for a long time in an eccentric orbit, 
like a comet. When, however, the meteor at, length, in any 
way, reaches the sun, a part of its motion is expended in in- 
creasing the sun's rotation, and thus compensating the loss 
of motion continually sustained by the sun in the evaporation 
of its material. The denser the resisting medium is in any 
system, the greater will be the revolution of its outer parts, 
and the larger will be the spiral trajectories which its falling 
bodies will describe. Such spiral or vortical motions as would 
thus be produced, or rather sustained, in the matter surround- 
ing the sun, is exhibited by the most powerful telescopes, in 
the forms of the appendages to certain nebulous stars, and in 
the structure of the so-called Spiral Nebulae. Perhaps the 
bodies which are supposed to give rise to the appearance of 
the zodiacal light would exhibit some such spiral arrangement, 
if seen from a point far above or below the ecliptic. 

It follows from this vortical motion, that the form which the 
diffused materials of the solar system would assume, or rather 
maintain, would be that of an oblate ellipsoid or of a flattened 
lenticular body. The height to which the matter would rise 
in the plane of the sun's equator before its massive and molec- 
ular motions would be arrested by gravitation, would be much 
greater than in the directions of the sun's axis of rotation. 
The degree of oblateness which such a system of diffused mat- 
ter will maintain depends on the frictions or resistances that 
successive strata exert on each other. It should be borne in 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. 27 

mind in this connection that friction is not a loss of force, 
where all kinds of force are taken into account. Friction or 
resistance can only effect a conversion of massive into molecu- 
lar motions, or the motion of velocity into the motion of heat. 
Hence, whatever velocity is lost by interior strata in the gase- 
ous materials of the solar system, and is not gained by those 
exterior to them, must yet be ultimately restored; for the sta- 
bility of such a system is no longer a question ■ this is insured 
in the fundamental mechanical law on which our speculations 
are founded. 

It may still be a question, however, whether the planetary 
bodies of such a system are successively produced and de- 
stroyed, like generations of animals and plants, or whether 
they are permanent elements- in a system of balanced forces 
and operations. So far as the effects of mutual perturbation 
are concerned, and independently of a resisting medium, as- 
tronomers have shown that the latter supposition is the more 
probable one ; but there are several other considerations which 
point to a different conclusion. In the first place, the consid- 
erations already mentioned. The existence of systematic rela- 
tions in the structure of the solar system, some of which are 
independent of its stability under the law of gravity, indicate 
the operations of causes other than the simple ones on which 
this stability depends, — such causes as the nebular hypothesis 
endeavored to define, but which we, in rejecting this hypothe- 
sis, have still to search for. 

It has undoubtedly occurred to our readers to ask how the 
planets stand related to the meteoric system, and in what man- 
ner, if at all, their motions and masses are affected by this per- 
petual shower of matter. As out of every two thousand 
million parts of the light and heat of the sun's radiation the 
earth receives one part, so out of the two thousand million 
meteors sent back in return the earth will receive one, or per- 
haps a somewhat larger- proportion, since the meteors are sup- 
posed to fall most thickly near the plane of the sun's equator. 
If we multiply this proportion by ten, as we probably may, it 
is still a very small quantity; but if we are permitted to multi- 
ply it by a factor of time as great as we please, this in.signifi- 



28 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

cance will disappear, and in its place we shall have a cosmical 
cause of the greatest moment in the history of the solar sys- 
tem. Two hundred million years is but a day in the cosmical 
eras, yet in that time the earth could receive as many bodies 
as fall to the sun in a year, or a hundredth part of the mass of 
the earth itself. In a hundred such days, then, the earth 
might be built up by the aggregation of meteors, provided it 
should lose none of the material thus collected, as the sun 
probably does. But this calculation proceeds on die supposi- 
tion that the earth would have caught as many meteors when 
it was smaller, as it probably does now. A correction is there- 
fore required which lengthens the period to three hundred such 
days, or to about a cosmical year, if we may so estimate times 
which are without limits or measure. In sixty thousand mil- 
lion years, then, the earth could have been made by the ag- 
gregation of meteors.* In this time the sun itself would have 
received and evaporated fifteen hundred times the amount of 
its present mass, provided a permanent amount of matter and 
heat should have been maintained in it during so long a period. 
In these estimates no account is taken of the heat immedi- 
ately absorbed in evaporation, or absorbed in the space in- 
cluded within the earth's orbit. This heat would probably 
require a still greater expenditure of motion, and the fall of a 
still greater number of bodies. Hence the period required to 
build up the earth's mass might be materially shortened. 

Such a method of inquiry, however, violates the canon we 
have laid down for our guidance in physical speculation. We 
must not suppose any action in nature to which there is not 
some counteraction, and no mode of production, however 
slow, from which in infinite time there could result an infinite 

* Most of the materials which fall to the earth are probably in the form of very small 
bodies, which must be disintegrated by heat in their passage through the atmosphere, 
and must consequently reach the earth's surface in the form of fine dust. At the rate 
of accumulation estimated above, this dust, when reduced to the mean density of the 
earth's materials, would add one foot to the thickness of its crust in about three thousand 
years. In the loose form of dust or mud this accumulation would amount to about a 
hundredth of an inch in a year. The materials which have accumulated within histor- 
ical periods over the ruins of ancient cities may thus in great part have been collected 
from the sky. The agencies of the winds and of flowing water in transporting and de- 
positing the loose materials of the earth's surface would distribute this star-dust in de- 
posits at the bottom of the sea, and in hills and mounds on the land. 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. 29 

product. We must, therefore, conclude that the planets either 
ultimately fall into the sun, and make a restitution of their 
peculations, or that heat and gravitation preserve in them also 
the balance of nature and the golden mean of virtue. The 
existence of a resisting medium favors the first supposition, 
unless it can be rendered probable that this medium revolves 
with velocities equal to those of the planets at the same dis- 
tances from the sun. There is also another cause affecting the 
mean distances of the planets. An increase of mass in the 
sun will diminish the size of the planetary orbits, and con- 
versely a diminution of this mass will increase the size of these 
orbits. The rate of change in the mass of the sun, whether 
to increase or to decrease, must depend on the relative rates 
of cooling by radiation and by evaporation. As the sun 
grows cooler by excessive radiation, its mass must be increased 
by the fall of meteors, and the planets will draw nearer to the 
sun ; but if its radiation be diminished, and a larger proportion 
of the heat be expended in evaporation, then the planets will 
withdraw from the sun. Such are the causes which may affect 
the mean distances of the planets. 

If on such grounds we may adopt the first of our supposi- 
tions, that the planets are successively formed and finally lost 
in the sun, like the meteors, the most probable hypothesis we 
can make concerning their origin is, that they are formed by 
the aggregation of meteors. Certain conditions, which, in the 
present state of our knowledge, it would perhaps be impossible 
to define, must determine the distances from the sun where 
these aggregations will begin ; but the body and the attraction 
of the planet, when once begun, will determine further aggre- 
gation until the planet either falls into the sun, or approaches 
to such a distance that the evaporation of its material keeps 
pace with the fall of matter Upon it. The size to which a 
planet could attain would thus be determined by the distance 
from the sun at which it begins to grow. A nearly circular 
orbit, and a small inclination of its plane to the plane of the 
sun's equator, would result from the circumstances attending 
the fall of the meteors, — their approach to the sun from every 



3° 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



direction near the plane of the sun's equator.* A vortical 
motion and a rotation of the planet might result from such 
aggregations, which would be analogous to those of the sun 
and the general system. A more rigorous and comprehensive 
discussion of such problems than has yet been attempted is 
required before trustworthy conclusions can be formed. 

The following considerations may materially affect the con- 
clusions we have drawn from the existence of a resisting me- 
dium. The gaseous medium of the solar system might receive 
from the sun's rotation, and by the mutual friction of its own 
materials, greater velocities in its interior parts than the planets 
could have at the same distances from the sun, provided the 
exterior parts should move with less than planetary velocities, 
and should press with a portion of their weight upon the parts 
below them. For the centrifugal forces of the interior parts 
might thus be balanced, not merely by their own gravitation, 
but by a portion also of the weight of the superincumbent 
masses. At a distance from the sun less than half the mean 
distance of the planet Mercury, a period of revolution equal 
to that of the sun would produce a planetary velocity. At a 
greater distance, the medium might revolve more rapidly than 
the planets. But there must be a limit where the revolutions 
would be simply self-sustaining, and beyond this the medium 
would move less rapidly than the planets. So far, therefore, 
as a resisting medium could affect the motions of the planetary 
bodies, it might tend to increase the dimensions of the interior 
orbits, and to diminish those of the exterior ones; and it would 
thus tend to concentrate the planets, not in the sun, but at this 
limiting distance, where the medium would neither accelerate 
nor retard their motions. The motions of the medium would 
produce the greatest effect upon the smaller bodies of the solar 
system, which would, therefore, approach most rapidly to this 
limiting distance. That region in the solar system, about half 
the distance from the sun to the orbit of Jupiter, which is so 
thickly crowded with small planetary bodies or asteroids, may 

* The rare occurrence of spots on the sun beyond thirty degrees either side of its 
equator may indicate some connection between these spots and the fall of meteors and 
serve to determine the limits of the meteoric system. 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. 31 

be regarded, on this hypothesis, as the region in which the 
gaseous medium now revolves with planetary velocity. Could 
this limiting distance remain fixed for a very long period, most 
of the planetary masses of the solar system might accumulate 
there, and be concentrated into one huge planet or secondary 
sun, and the solar system would thus be converted into a 
binary system, like those observed among the stars. But from 
the small amount of matter probably contained in the asteroid 
system; we ought to conclude that this limiting distance changes 
from time to time, as the medium grows denser or rarer. 

The planets are not the only aggregations of meteoric bodies 
which we have to account for. Besides the comets, there are 
probably streams of meteors falling to or circulating around 
the sun. This is rendered very probable by the phenomena of 
the showers of these bodies which fall into our atmosphere at 
certain seasons of the year, or at certain positions in the earth's 
orbit.* And further, the rings of Saturn are probably examples 
of the same kind of meteoric aggregation. For of the three 
hypotheses in regard to the constitution of these rings which 
have been submitted to rigorous mathematical examination. — 
namely, first, that they are solid, secondly, that they are fluid, 
and, thirdly, that they are composed of distinct bodies or me- 
teors, — the latter is the only one which has been found to 
afford the conditions of stability which are implied in their 
continued existence. It is unnecessary to add the physical 
reasons which render this hypothesis still more probable. 
We have no space to consider the many interesting geological 

* There is a period of about eleven years in the numbers of spots that appear on 
the surface of the sun, a period coincident with that of the amount of diurnal variations 
in terrestrial magnetism, — an amount undoubtedly due to the influence of the sun. 
This period also coincides nearly with the period of the revolution of Jupiter, the largest 
planet in our system. If, then* we may suppose that the sun's spots are occasioned by 
the fall of large meteors, the courses of which lie near to the orbit of Jupiter, the attrac- 
tions of this planet, alternately turning such a stream of bodies upon and away from the 
surface of the sun, would connect these three nearly coincident periods by a common 
physical cause 

The phenomena of magnetism and electricity, as subordinate manifestations of motion 
and conditions of motion, have not been included in our speculations on the commuta- 
tions of "power," on account of their insignificant values as compared with the three 
principal forms of "power." For the same reason, we omit any consideration of the 
numerous but minute modifications of "power" which are manifested by the forces of 
vital phenomena on the surface of the earth. 



32 



PHIL OSOPHICA L DISC USSIONS. 



consequences which follow from our hypothesis. Let it suffice 
to remark, that the formation of the earth's mass by meteoric 
aggregation precludes the hypothesis, otherwise improbable, 
that the core of the earth is a molten mass. The occurrence 
of volcanoes in local systems, distinct from each other, points 
to local causes of an unknown chemical character as the true 
sources of these phenomena. The heterogeneous character of 
the materials of the earth's crust, in which are mingled, in the 
most intimate manner, all kinds of substances, irrespectively of 
their chemical affinities, and in opposition to their chemical 
forces of aggression, could hardly be the results of the actions 
of heat and aqueous solution, both of which afford conditions 
favorable to chemical aggregation. Indeed, in most cases in 
which such aggregation occurs, where homogeneous and chem- 
ically simple substances are found in considerable quantities, 
the agency either of heat or aqueous solution is evident. It is 
hardly necessary to add, that the theory of meteoric aggregation 
is the one which would most readily explain these facts. 

But we must here leave the consideration of these interest- 
ing problems, and return to a topic much more obscure, to 
which we called attention a few pages back. 

The dynamical theory of heat has not only suggested new 
and interesting inquiries concerning the constitution of the 
universe, but it throws new light in the philosophy of chemical 
phenomena on such problems as the origin of the three states 
of aggregation in matter, and on the character of the changes 
which may take place under circumstances beyond the reach 
of chemical experiments and observation. 

That the dreams of the alchemists were at fault rather in 
point of method than of doctrine, is a confession which the 
modern chemist must make, when he compares the slight re- 
sources of experiment at his command with the possibilities of 
nature. If, as has been surmised, the characteristic properties 
of different kinds of matter consist in characteristic internal 
or molecular motions (and molecular conditions of motion), a 
complete destruction of such motions would obliterate all the 
characteristic differences of matter, and such a result might 
be attained by the production of absolute cold. In respect to 



A PHYSICAL THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. 33 

the motions of light and heat, however, the universe, so far as 
we know it, and even so far as we could know it, is a perfectly 
continuous body. In no corner or recess of its unfathomable 
depths to which the feeblest light of a single star could find its 
way, can there be an absence of the motions of light and heat. 
Nothing can set bounds to the all-pervading reach of these mo- 
tions except limits to that medium of motion, the luminiferous 
ether; and these, so far as all cognizable physical conditions 
are concerned, would be limits to space itself. That potent 
sidereal influence, the absolute cold, transmuting all substances 
into one, could only arise momentarily, in nodal points or lines 
or surfaces, but could not be extended discontinuously into 
space of three dimensions. What may happen at such times 
and limits, where matter, expiring from one form of chemical 
life, may be awakened to another, according to the kind of 
molecular agitation which may next overtake it, and deter- 
mine its history, perhaps for myriads of years, is what the 
chemist cannot tell us, and only the alchemist can dream. It 
suffices for our instruction, that the chemistry of absolute cold 
has possibilities of which experimental chemistry affords no 
criterion, and may play a part in the economy of nature not 
inferior to that of gravitation or heat. 

But it may be objected, on grounds of experimental chem- 
istry, "that the sun's heat, though sufficient to volatize the 
least fusible materials, could not keep them in the form of 
vapor at the heights and in the temperature of the interplan- 
etary spaces, much less lift them in the form of vapor to the 
heights of the interstellar regions whence the meteors are sup- 
posed to fall. For most bodies which are solid at ordinary ter- 
restrial temperatures tend, upon cooling, to crystallize with 
such energy that they would soon be precipitated from the 
vaporous form." But this objection takes no account of those 
effects of diffusion, expansion, and commingling of heterogene- 
ous materials, which must remove the parts of a volatilized 
body to such hopeless distances from each other that the forces 
of chemical aggregation might require ages to collect what is 
thus dispersed. Nor can any account be taken of such un- 
known laws of chemical affinity and aggregation as are possible 



34 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

under the circumstances we are considering. The known laws 
of chemical action should, then, be ranked with those laws- of 
life, exhibited in the phenomena of growth, which were too 
hastily generalized and applied, in "the theory of evolution," 
to the interpretation of the riddles and the explication of the 
order of the System of the Worlrl , 



NATURAL THEOLOGY AS A POSITIVE 
SCIENCE* 

Natural history and anatomy have hitherto furnished the 
principal grounds to the theologian for the speculation of final 
causes, since these sciences exhibit many instances of a com- 
plex combination of causes in the structures and habits of or- 
ganic bodies, and at the same time a distinct and peculiar class 
of effects, namely, those which constitute the well-being and 
perfection of organic life; and from these causes and effects, 
regarded as means and ends in the order of nature, the argu- 
ments and illustrations of natural theology have been chiefly 
drawn. The facts of these sciences are not merely the most 
useful to the theologian ; they are indeed indispensable, and 
occupy a peculiar position in his argument, since they alone 
afford the class of effects on which, assumed as ends, the spec- 
ulation of final causes ultimately rests. 

It is only by assuming human welfare, or with this the wel- 
fare also of other sentient beings, as the end for which the uni- 
verse exists, that the doctrine of final causes has hitherto 
found any support in natural science. 

Though it is still maintained by theologians that the argu- 
ments for design are properly inductive arguments, yet the 
physical proofs of natural theology are not regarded by many 
modern writers as having any independent weight; and it is 
in mental and moral science that the facts are sought which 
will warrant the induction of design from the general phenom- 
ena of nature. It is hardly considered logical, even by the 
theological writers of our day, to conclude, with Paley, "that 

* From the North American Review, for January, 1865. 



36 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

the works of nature proceed from intelligence and design ; be- 
cause, in the properties of relation to a purpose, subserviency to 
a use, they resemble what intelligence and design are con- 
stantly producing, and what nothing [which we know] except 
intelligence and design ever produce at all." For it is denied 
by the physical philosopher that causes and effects in natural 
phenomena can be interpreted into the terms of natural theol- 
ogy by any key which science itself affords. By what crite- 
rion, he would ask, can we distinguish among the numberless 
effects, that are also causes, and among the causes that may, 
for aught we can know, be also effects, — how can we distin- 
guish which are the means and which are the ends ? What 
effects are we warranted by observation in calling final, or final 
causes, or the ends for which the others exist ? The belief 
on other grounds that there are final causes, that the universe 
exists for some purpose, is one thing ; but the belief that sci- 
ence discloses, or even that science can disclose, what this 
purpose is, is quite a different thing. The designation of those 
effects as final in nature which contribute to human desires or 
human welfare, or even to the welfare of all sentient beings, 
cannot be legitimately made for the purpose of this argument, 
since human and other sentient beings are not the agents by 
which these supposed ends are attained; neither can the 
causes which bring these effects to pass be regarded as ser- 
vants obedient to the commands of the agents to whom these 
effects are desirable. The analogy of natural production to 
human contrivance fails them at the very outset; and the in- 
terpretation of natural causes and effects as means and ends, 
virtually assumes the conclusion of the argument, and is not 
founded on any natural evidence. These considerations are 
overlooked by most writers on this subject, who, in addition 
to a legitimate faith in final causes, assume the dogma that 
these causes are manifest or discoverable. They begin with 
the definition, sometimes called an argument, "that a combi- 
nation of means conspiring to a particular end implies intelli- 
gence," and they then assume that the causes which science 
discovers are means, or exist for the sake of the effects which 
science accounts for; and from the relation of means to ends, 
thus assumed, they infer intelligence. 



NATURAL THEOLOGY AS A POSLTIVE SCIENCE. 37 

The definition we have quoted contains, however, more 
than is really implied in this argument, since the relation of 
means to ends in itself, and without further qualification, im- 
plies intelligence, while a combination of means conspiring to 
a particular end implies a high degree of intelligence ; and it 
is with this, the degree of intelligence manifested in the phe- 
nomena of nature, that scientific discourses on the natural evi- 
dences are really dealing, though sometimes unconsciously. 
These discourses really aim, not so much to prove the exist- 
ence of design in the universe, as to show the wisdom of cer- 
tain designs which are assumed to be manifest. But for this 
purpose it is requisite to translate the facts of science, and 
those combinations of causes which are discovered to be the 
conditions of particular effects, into the terms of the argument, 
and to show that these combinations are means, or exist for 
the sake of particular effects, for which, as ends, the universe 
itself must be shown to exist, — a task for which science is ob- 
viously incompetent. 

Waiving these fundamental objections to the argument for 
design, which, let us repeat, are not objections to the spiritual 
doctrine of final causes, or to the belief that final causes exist, 
we will turn to the objections which modern writers of natu- 
ral theology themselves allow. 

It is essential to the validity of Paley's argument, that " de- 
sign," or the determination of effects by the intelligence of an 
agent, be shown to be not merely the only known cause of 
such effects, but also to be a real cause, or an independent de- 
termination by an efficient agent. If intelligence itself be a 
product, if the human powers of contrivance are themselves 
effects, it follows that designed effects should be ascribed, not 
to intelligence, but to the causes of intelligence ; and the same 
objection will hold against the theologian's use of the word 
"design," which he urges against the physicist's use of the 
word "law." "It is a perversion of language," says Paley, 
"to assign any law as the efficient operative cause of anything. 
A law presupposes an agent, for it only is the mode according 
to which the agent proceeds ; it implies a power, for it is the 
order according to which this power acts. Without this agent, 



38 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

without this power, which are both distinct from itself, the 
'law' does nothing, is nothing." By substituting the word 
"design" for the word "law" in this quotation, we have the 
materialist's objection to the theologian's perversion of lan- 
guage. This objection was entirely overlooked by Paley, who 
seems to have thought it sufficient for the purposes of his ar- 
gument to consider only the. phenomena of the visible material 
universe. But later writers have seen the necessity of basing 
the argument for design on the psychological doctrine that in- 
telligence is a free, undetermined power, and that design is the 
free, undetermined act of this power. Without this assump- 
tion, which indeed Paley himself virtually makes, it would be 
as unphilosophical to refer the course of nature to the deter- 
mination of intelligence, as it is to refer it to the determination 
of the abstraction which the materialist prefers, or to the 
"agency of law." 

" That intelligence stands first in the absolute order of exist- 
ence, — in other words, that final preceded efficient causes, — 
and that the universe is governed by moral laws," are the two 
propositions, the proof of which, says Sir William Hamilton, 
is the proof of a God; and this proof "establishes its founda- 
tion exclusively on the phenomena of mind." Without this 
psychological proof, the order of adaptation cannot be logically 
referred to the order of design ; and the resemblance of human 
contrivances to the adaptations of nature can only warrant 
the conclusion that both proceed from similar conditions, and 
by a power of whose efficiency human intelligence and phys- 
ical laws are alike manifestations, but whose nature neither hu- 
man intelligence comprehends nor physical laws can disclose. 

Even such a result, which is all that the unaided physical 
sciences can compass, is not altogether barren of religious in- 
terest, though it is made so by the materialist's attempt to de- 
fine the nature of power by assigning to physical forces an 
absolute efficiency. The spiritualist, on the other hand, if we 
allow his psychological proof that intelligence stands first in 
the absolute order of existence, and is a free, undetermined 
power, is logically competent to interpret the order of nature 
as a designed order. Yet to him physical proofs of design 



NATURAL THEOLOGY AS A POSITIVE SCIENCE. 39 

have little or no value, and can only serve as obscure and 
enigmatical illustrations of what is far more clearly apparent in 
the study of mind. And though logically competent to inter- 
pret the order of design, if his spiritual doctrine be true, yet 
the difficulties which we first mentioned, and waived for the 
nonce, are difficulties as insuperable to the psychologist as to 
the physicist. He gains no criterion from his studies by which 
to distinguish, in the order of natural phenomena, which are 
the means and which are the ends, or where the relation of 
means to ends is to be found, among the infinite successions 
of effects which are also causes, and of causes which may, for 
aught he can know, be also effects. His faith in final causes 
is not a guide by which he can determine what the final causes 
are by which he believes the order of nature to be determined. 

These theoretical objections to a philosophy, which assigns 
physical reasons for a faith in final causes, are by no means 
the most important objections. The practical influences and 
effects of such philosophizing are, we believe, more obnoxious 
to the true interests of religion than its methods are to the 
true principles of philosophy, and fully justify an examination 
of its arguments. For bad arguments may go for nothing, 
while good ones necessitate their conclusions • and we think it 
fortunate for the purity of religious truth that theologians 
have succeeded no better in this direction. 

Not only do the peculiar doctrines of natural theology add 
nothing to the grounds of a faith in final causes ; they, in effect, 
narrow this faith to ideas which scarcely rise in dignity above 
the rank of superstitions. If to believe that God is what we 
can think him to be is blasphemy, what shall we call the at- 
tempt to discover his intentions and to interpret his plans in 
nature ? If science were able to discover a much closer anal- 
ogy than it does between the adaptations of nature and the 
designs of human contrivance, would it be any less derogatory 
to the dignity of the Divine nature to attempt by such analo- 
gies to fathom his designs and plans, or to suppose that what 
appears as a designed order is really any clew to the purposes 
of the Almighty ? And when, even transcending this degree of 
presumption, theology would fix a limit to the researches and 



40 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

hypotheses of science, on the ground that they tend to subvert 
religious doctrines, or the assumed results of a religious phi- 
losophy, we are warranted — nay, constrained, from practical 
considerations — to question the grounds of its pretensions, to 
allow it no longer to shield its falseness and weakness behind 
the dignity and worth of the interests to which it is falsely 
dedicated. It is from the illegitimate pretensions of natural 
theology that the figment of a conflict between science and re- 
ligion has arisen ; and the efforts of religious thinkers to coun- 
teract the supposed atheistical tendencies of science, and to 
give a religious interpretation to its facts, have only served to 
deepen the false impression that such a conflict actually ex- 
ists, so that revolutions in scientific theories have been made to 
appear in the character of refutations of religious doctrines. 

That there is a fundamental distinction between the natures 
of scientific and religious ideas ought never to be doubted ; 
but that contradiction can arise, except between religious and 
superstitious ideas, ought not for a moment to be admitted. 
Progress in science is really a progress in religious truth, not 
because any new reasons are discovered for the doctrines of 
religion, but because advancement in knowledge frees us from 
the errors both of ignorance and of superstition, exposing the 
mistakes of a false religious philosophy, as well as those of a 
false science. If the teachings of natural theology are liable 
to be refuted or corrected by progress in knowledge, it is legit- 
imate to suppose, not that science is irreligious, but that these 
teachings are superstitious ; and whatever evils result from the 
discoveries of science are attributable to the rashness of the theo- 
logian, and not to the supposed irreligious tendencies of science. 
When a proof of special design is invalidated by the discovery 
that a particular effect in the operations of nature, which pre- 
viously appeared to result from a special constitution and ad- 
justment of certain forces, is really a consequent of the general 
properties of matter, — when, for example, the laws of plan- 
etary motion were shown to result from the law of universal 
gravitation, and the mathematical plan of the solar system was 
seen to be a consequent of a single universal principle, — the 
harm, if there be any, results from the theologian's mistakes, 



NATURAL THEOLOGY AS A POSLTLVE SCLENCE. 4I 

and not from the corrections of science. He should refrain from 
attributing any special plan or purpose to the creation, if he 
would find in science a constant support to religious truth. 
But this abstinence does not involve a withdrawal of the mind 
from the proper religious interests of natural science, nor 
weaken a legitimate faith in final causes. Even the New- 
tonian mechanism of the heavens, simple, primordial, and 
necessary as it seems, still discloses to the devout mind evi- 
dence of a wisdom unfathomable, and of a design which tran- 
scends interpretation • and when, in the more complicated order 
of organic, life, surprising and beautiful adaptations inspire in 
the naturalist the conviction that purpose and intelligence are 
manifested in them, — that they spring from a nature akin to the 
devising power of his own mind, — there is nothing in science 
or philosophy which can legitimately rebuke his enthusiasm, — 
nothing, unless it be the dogmatism which would presumptu- 
ously interpret as science what is only manifest to faith, or 
would require of faith that it shall justify itself by proofs. 

The progress of science has indeed been a progress in relig- 
ious truth, but in spite of false theology, and in a way which 
narrow theologians have constantly opposed. It has denned 
with greater and greater distinctness the boundary between 
what can be discovered and what cannot. It has purified re- 
ligious truth by turning back the moral consciousness to dis- 
cover clearly in itself what it had obscurely divined from its 
own interpretations of nature. It has impressed on the mind 
of the cautious inquirer the futility, as well as the irreverence, 
of attempting a philosophy which can at best be but a finer 
sort of superstition, a real limitation to our conceptions of final 
causes, while apparently an extension of them. 

But instead of learning these lessons from the experience 
of repeated failures, theologians have constantly opposed new 
hypotheses in science, until proof has compelled a tardy assent, 
and even then they have retreated to other regions of science, 
as if these were the only refuge of a persecuted faith. 

Humility and cautiousness, and that suspension of judgment 
in matters about which we really know so little, which a recent 
theological writer has recommended, in view of the pending 



42 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



controversy on the origin of organic species and adaptations, 
are virtues, which, had they been generally cultivated by theo- 
logians, would have rendered this controversy harmless at least, 
if not unnecessary. 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER* 

Why the inductive and mathematical sciences, after their 
first rapid development at the culmination of Greek civiliza- 
tion, advanced so slowly for two thousand years, — and why in 
the following two hundred years a knowledge of natural and 
mathematical science has accumulated, which so vastly exceeds 
all that was previously known that these sciences may be justly 
regarded as the products of our own times, — are questions 
which have interested the modern philosopher not less than 
the objects with which these sciences are more immediately 
conversant. Was it in the employment of a new method of 
research, or in the exercise of greater virtue in the use of old 
methods, that this singular modern phenomenon had its ori- 
gin ? Was the long period one of arrested development, and 
is the modern era one of a normal growth ? or should we as- 
cribe the characteristics of both periods to so-called historical 
accidents, — to the influence of conjunctions in circumstances 
of which no explanation is possible, save in the omnipotence 
and wisdom of a guiding Providence ? 

The explanation which has become commonplace, that the 
ancients employed deduction chiefly in their scientific inqui- 
ries, while the moderns employ induction, proves to be too 
narrow, and fails upon close examination to point with suffi- 
cient distinctness the contrast that is evident between ancient 
and modern scientific doctrines and inquiries. For all knowl- 
edge is founded on observation, and proceeds from this by anal- 
ysis and synthesis, by synthesis and analysis, by induction and 
deduction, and if possible by verification, or by new appeals to 

* From the North American Review, April, 1S65. 



44 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



observation under the guidance of deduction, — by steps which 
are indeed correlative parts of one method ; and the ancient 
sciences afford examples of every one of these methods, or parts 
of the one complete method, which have been generalized from 
the examples of science. 

A failure to employ or to employ adequately any one of 
these partial methods, an imperfection in the arts and re- 
sources of observation and experiment, carelessness in observa- 
tion, neglect of relevant facts, vagueness and carelessness in 
reasoning, and the failure to draw the consequences of theory 
and test them by appeal to experiment and observation, — these 
are the faults which cause all failures to ascertain truth, 
whether among the ancients or the moderns ; but this statement 
does not explain why the modern is possessed of a greater 
virtue, and by what means he attained to his superiority. 
Much less does it explain the sudden growth of science in 
recent times. 

The attempt to discover the explanation of this phenome- 
non in the antithesis of "facts" and "theories" or "facts" and 
"ideas," — in the neglect among the ancients of the former, and 
•their too exclusive attention to the latter, — proves also to be 
too narrow, as well as open to the charge of vagueness. For, 
in the first place, the antithesis is not complete. Facts and the- 
ories are not co-ordinate species. Theories, if true, are facts, — 
a particular class of facts indeed, generally complex ones, but 
still facts. Facts, on the other hand, even in the narrowest 
signification of the word, if they be at all complex, and if a 
logical connection subsists between their constituents, have all 
the positive attributes of theories. 

Nevertheless, this distinction, however inadequate it may be 
to explain the source of true method in science, is well found- 
ed, and connotes an important character in true method. A 
fact is a proposition of which the verification by an appeal to 
the primary sources of our knowledge or to experience is 
direct and simple. A theory, on the other hand, if true, has 
all the characteristics of a fact, except that its verification is 
possible only by indirect, remote, and difficult means. To con- 
vert theories into facts is to add simple verification, and the 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 45 

theory thus acquires the full characteristics of a fact. When 
Pascal caused the Torricellian tube to be carried up the Puy 
de Dome, and thus showed that the mercurial column was sus- 
tained by the weight of the atmosphere, he brought the theory 
of atmospheric pressure nearly down to the level of a fact of 
observation. But even in this most remarkable instance of sci- 
entific discovery theory was not wholly reduced to fact, since 
the verification, though easy, was not entirely simple, and was 
incomplete until further observations showed that the quantity 
of the fall in the Torricellian tube agreed with deductions from 
the combined theories of atmospherical pressure and elasticity. 
In the same way the theory of universal gravitation fails to be- 
come a fact in the proper sense of this word, however complete 
its verification, because this verification is not simple and direct, 
or through the immediate activity of our perceptive powers. 

Modern science deals then no less with theories than with 
facts, but always as much as possible with the verification of 
theories, — if not to make them facts by simple verification 
through experiment and observation, at least to prove their 
truth by indirect verification. 

The distinction of fact and theory thus yields an important 
principle, of which M. Comte and his followers have made 
much account. It is in the employment of verification, they 
say, and in the possibility of it, that the superiority of modern 
inductive research consists ; and it is because the ancients did 
not, or could not, verify their theories, that they made such 
insignificant progress in science. It is indisputable that verifi- 
cation is essential to the completeness of scientific method ; but 
there is still room for debate as to what constitutes verification 
in the various departments of philosophical inquiry. So long 
as the philosophy of method fails to give a complete inventory 
of our primary sources of knowledge, and cannot decide au- 
thoritatively what are the origins of first truths, or the truths 
of observation, so long will it remain uncertain what is a legiti- 
mate appeal to observation, or what is a real verification. The 
Platonists or the rationalists may equally with the empiricists 
claim verification for their theories ; for do they not appeal to 
the reason for confirmation of deductions from their theories, 



46 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS, 

which they regard as founded on observation of what the rea- 
son reveals to them ? 

The positivists' principle of verification comes, then, only to 
this, — that, inasmuch as mankind are nearly unanimous about 
the testimony and trustworthiness of their senses, but are di- 
vided about the validity of all other kinds of authority, which 
they in a word call the reason, or internal sense, therefore verifi- 
cation by the senses produces absolute conviction, while verifi- 
cation by the reason settles nothing, but is liable to the same 
uncertainty which attends the primary appeals to this authority 
for the data of speculative knowledge. 

But not only does the so-called metaphysical philosophy em- 
ploy a species of verification by appealing to the testimony of 
reason, consciousness, or internal sense ; but the ancient phys- 
ical sciences afford examples of the confirmation of theory by 
observation proper. The Ptolemaic system of astronomy was 
an instance of the employment of every one of the partial steps 
of true method; and the theory of epicycles not only sought to 
represent the facts of observation, but also by the prediction of 
astronomical phenomena to verify the truth of its representa- 
tion. Modern astronomy does not proceed otherwise, except 
that its theories represent a much greater number of facts of 
observation, and are confirmed by much more efficient experi- 
mental tests. 

The difference, then, between ancient and modern science is 
not truly characterized by any of the several explanations which 
have been proposed. The explanation, however, which, in our 
opinion, comes nearest to the true solution, and yet fails to des- 
ignate the real point of difference, is that which the positivists 
find in the distinction between "objective method" and "sub- 
jective method." The objective method is verification by 
sensuous tests, tests of sensible experience, — a deduction from 
theory of consequences, of which we may have sensible experi- 
ences if they be true. The subjective method, on the other 
hand, appeals to the tests of internal evidence, tests of reason, 
and the data of self-consciousness. But whatever be the origin 
of the theories of science, whether from a systematic examina- 
tion of empirical facts by conscious induction, or from the 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 47 

natural biases of the mind, the so-called intuitions of reason, 
in other words what seems probable without a distinct survey 
of our experiences, — whatever the origin, real or ideal, the value 
of these theories can only be tested, say the positivists, by an 
appeal to sensible experience, by deductions from them of con- 
sequences which we can confirm by the undoubted testimony 
of the senses. Thus, while ideal or transcendental elements 
are admitted into scientific researches, though in themselves 
insusceptible of simple verification, they must still show creden- 
tials from the senses, either by affording from themselves con- 
sequences capable of sensuous verification, or by yielding such 
consequences in conjunction with ideas which by themselves 
are verifiable. 

It is undoubtedly true, that one of the leading traits of 
modern scientific research is this reduction of ideas to the tests 
of experience. The systematic development of ideas through 
induction from the first and simplest facts of observation, is by 
no means so obvious a characteristic. Inductions are still per- 
formed for the most part unconsciously and unsystematically. 
Ideas are developed by the sagacity of the expert, rather than 
by the systematic procedures of the philosopher. But when 
and however ideas are developed science cares nothing, for it 
is only by subsequent tests of sensible experience that ideas 
are admitted into the pandects of science. 

It is of no consequence to scientific astronomy whence the 
theory of gravitation arose; whether as an induction from the 
theories of attractions and the law of radiations, or from the 
rational simplicity of this law itself, as the most natural suppo- 
sition which could be made. Science asks no questions about 
the ontological pedigree or a priori character of a theory, but 
is content to judge it by its performance; and it is thus that a 
knowledge of nature, having all the certainty which the senses 
are competent to inspire, has been attained, — a knowledge 
which maintains a strict neutrality toward all philosophical 
systems, and concerns itself not at all with the genesis or a 
priori grounds of ideas. 

This mode of philosophizing is not, however, exclusively 
found in modern scientific research. Ptolemy claimed for his 



48 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS.. 

epicycles only that "they saved the appearances;" and he- 
might have said, with as much propriety as Newton, "Hypothe- 
ses 11011 Jingo" for it was the aim of his research to represent 
abstractly, and by the most general formulas, the characteris- 
tics of the movements of the planets, — an aim which modern 
astronomy, with a much simpler hypothesis, and with immense- 
ly increased facilities, still pursues. 

We find, therefore, that while moderns follow a true method 
of investigation with greater facilities and greater fidelity than 
the ancients, and with a clearer apprehension of its elements 
and conditions, yet that no new discoveries in method have 
been made, and no general sources of truth have been pointed 
out, which were not patent and known to the ancients; and we. 
have so far failed to discover any solution to the problem with 
which we began. We have seen that it was not by the em- 
ployment of a new method of research, but in the exercise of 
greater virtue in the use of old methods, that modern scientific 
researches have succeeded. But whence this greater virtue ? 
What vivifying, energizing influence awakened the sixteenth 
century to the movement, which has continued down to the 
present day to engross, and even to create, the energies of 
philosophic thought in the study of natural phenomena? Ob- 
viously some interest was awakened, which had before been 
powerless, or had influenced only men of rare and extraordi- 
nary genius, or else some opposing interest had ceased to exer- 
cise a preponderating influence. 

We have now arrived at a new order of inquiries. We ask 
no longer what are the differences of method between ancient 
and modern scientific researches, but we seek the difference in 
the motives which actuated the philosophic inquiries of the two 
periods. We seek for the interests which in modern times 
have so powerfully drawn men of all orders of intelligence to 
the pursuit of science, and to an observance of the conditions 
requisite for its successful prosecution. We do not inquire 
what course has led to successful answers in science, but what 
motives have prompted the pertinent questions. 

In place of the positivists' phraseology, that the ancients 
followed "the subjective method," or appealed for the verifica : 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 



49 



tion of their theories to natural beliefs, while the modems fol- 
low "the objective method," or appeal to new and independent 
experimental evidence, — if. we substitute the word "motive" 
for "method," we have the terms of one of the conclusions on 
which we wish to insist. But these require explanation. 

By a subjective motive we mean one having its origin in 
natural universal human interests and emotions, which existecb 
before philosophy was born, which continue to exist in the 
maturity of philosophy, and determine the character of an 
important and by no means defunct order of human specula- 
tions. By an objective motive we mean one having an empir- 
ical origin, arising in the course of an inquiry; springing from 
interests which are defined by what we already know, and not 
by what we have always felt, — interests which depend on ac- 
quired knowledge, and not on natural desires and emotions. 
Among the latter we must include the natural desire for 
knowledge, or the primitive, undisciplined sentiment of curi- 
osity. This becomes an objective motive when it ceases 
to be associated with our fears, our respects, our aspirations, 
— our emotional nature; when it ceases to prompt questions 
as to w r hat relates to our personal destiny, our ambitions, our 
moral worth; when it ceases to have man, his personal and 
social nature, as its central and controlling objects. A curi- 
osity which is determined chiefly or solely by the felt imperfec- 
tions of knowledge as such, and without reference to the uses 
this knowledge may subserve, is prompted by what we call an 
objective motive. 

A spirit of inquiry which is freed from the influence of our 
active powers, and the interests that gave birth to theological 
and metaphysical philosophies, — which yields passively and 
easily to the direction of objective motives, to the felt imperfec- 
tions of knowledge as such, — is necessarily, at all times, a 
weak feeling; and before a body of systematic, well-digested, 
and well-ascertained scientific truth had been generated, could 
hardly have had any persistent influence on the direction of 
inquiry. 

The motives to theological and metaphysical speculation 
exist from the beginning of civilized human life in the active 
3 



5 o PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

emotional nature of man. Curiosity as a love of the marvel- 
ous, or as a love of facts, — new facts, prized because they are 
new and stimulating, — also dates back of civilized life. These 
motives find play in human nature, as it emerges from a semi- 
animal state; but they also persist and determine the growth 
of the human mind in its most advanced development. 

The questions of philosophy proper are human desires and 
fears and aspirations — human emotions — taking an intel- 
lectual form. Science follows, but does not supersede, this phi- 
losophy. The three phases which the positivists assign to the 
development of the human mind — the Theological, the Met- 
aphysical, and the Positive or Scientific — are not in reality 
successive, except in their beginnings. They co-exist in all the 
highest developments of civilization and mental activity. They, 
co-existed in the golden age of Greek civilization, in the in- 
tense mental activity of the Middle Ages. They move on to- 
gether in this marvelous modern era. But until this latest 
epoch positive science was always the inferior philosophy, — 
hardly a distinct philosophy at all, — not yet born. But at the 
beginning of the modern era its gestation was completed. A 
body of knowledge existed, sufficiently extensive, coherent, and 
varied, to bear within it a life of its own, — an independent 
life, — which was able to collect to itself, by its own determina- 
tions, the materials of a continued, new, and ever-increasing 
mental activity, — an activity determined solely by an objective 
curiosity, or by curiosity in its purest, fullest, and highest en- 
ergy. 

We are probably indebted to the few men of scientific genius 
who lived during the slow advancement of modern civilization 
for the foundation of this culture, — for the accumulation of 
the knowledge requisite for this subsequent growth. These 
men were doubtless, for the most part, the products of their 
own time and civilization, as indeed all great men have been, 
but still originators, by concentrating and making productive 
the energies, tendencies, and knowledges which, but for them, 
would have remained inert and unfruitful. It is to such men, 
born at long intervals in the slow progress of civilization, each 
carrying forward a little the work of his predecessor, that we 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 5I 

probably owe our modern science, rather than to the influence 
of any single mind, like Bacon, who was, like his predecessors, 
but the lens which collected the light of his times, — who 
prophesied rather than inaugurated the new era. And we owe 
science to the combined energies of individual men of genius, 
rather than to any tendency to progress inherent in civilization. 

We find, then, the explanation of the modern development 
of science in the accumulation of a body of certified knowl- 
edge, sufficiently extensive to engage and discipline a rational 
scientific curiosity, and stimulate it to act independently of 
other motives. It is doubtless true that other motives have 
influenced this development, and especially that motives of 
material utility have had a powerful effect in stimulating 
inquiry. Ancient schools of philosophy despised narrow 
material utilities, the servile arts, and sought no instruction in 
what moderns dignify by the name of useful arts; but modern 
science finds in the requirements of the material arts the safest 
guide to exact knowledge. A theory wbich is utilized receives 
the highest possible certificate of truth. Navigation by the aid 
of astronomical tables, the magnetic telegraph, the innumer- 
able utilities of mechanical and chemical science, are constant 
and perfect tests of scientific theories, and afford the standard 
of certitude, which science has been able to apply so exten- 
sively in its interpretations of natural phenomena. 

But the motives proper to science, though purified by their 
dissociation from the subjective determinations and tendencies, 
which gave an anthropomorphic and teleological character to 
ancient views of nature, are not the only legitimate motives to 
philosophical inquiry. There is another curiosity purified by 
its association with the nobler sentiments, — with wonder, ad- 
miration, veneration, — and with the interests of our moral and 
aesthetical natures. This curiosity is the motive to philosophy 
proper. "Wonder is a highly philosophical affection," says 
Plato's Socrates ; " indeed, there is no other principle of philos- 
ophy but this." 

Curiosity determined by natural sentiments and emotions — 
subjective curiosity — is the cause of a culture co-extensive with 
civilization, long preceding the growth of science, and constitut- 



5 2 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

ing all that is peculiar to civilized life except the material arts. 
However meanly the conclusions of theological and metaphys- 
ical speculations may appear, when tried by the objective stand- 
ard of science, they too have their superiorities, by the test of 
which science becomes in turn insignificant. Unverified con- 
clusions, vague ideas, crude fancies, they may be, but they cer- 
tainly are the products of activities which constitute more of 
human happiness and human worth than the narrow material 
standards of science have been able to measure. 

Philosophy proper should be classed with the Religions and 
with the Fine Arts, and estimated rather by the dignity of its 
motives, and the value it directs us to, than by the value of its 
own attainments. To condemn this pursuit because it fails to 
accomplish what science does, would be to condemn that which 
has formed in human nature habits, ideas, and associations on 
which all that is best in us depends, — would warrant the con- 
demnation of science itself, since science scarcely existed at all 
for two thousand years of civilization, and represented as a dis- 
tinct department during this period only the interests of the 
servile arts. The objects of Philosophy were those which the 
religious ideas and emotions of man presented to his specula- 
tive curiosity. These motives, though proper to Philosophy, 
also gave direction to inquiries in Physics and Astronomy. 
The Fine Arts sprang from the same interests, and persisted 
through the conservative power of religious interests in a de- 
velopment to which the modern world offers no parallel. We 
have no styles in Art, no persistently pursued efforts for per- 
fection in beauty, because we are not held to the conditions of 
this perfection by the religious motives which directed ancient 
Art. The growth of Theology and Metaphysics is less vigor- 
ous now for the same reason. Theology was Philosophy de- 
veloped in the interests of Religion or of religious feeling, and 
Metaphysics was cultivated in the interests of Theology. Both 
aimed at truth ; both were determined by the same love of sim- 
plicity and unity in knowledge, which determines all search 
after truth; but neither cared for simple truth alone. When 
pursued for the truth of fact alone, they both degenerate into 
affectation and emptiness. We do not omit the sceptical phi- 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 53 

losophies of antiquity from this description, because they were 
not held independently of the religious interests of the orthodox 
philosophy, but in opposition to them or in criticism of them. 

Theology and Metaphysics failed to apply a correct method 
and to arrive at certain results, not because philosophers were 
ignorant of method, but because the object-matters of their re- 
search were not questions of sensible experience, — were not 
mere questions of facts of which the mind is the passive recip- 
ient through the senses. Their aim was to prove truth, not to 
discover it, — to reduce opinions and ideas which had the war- 
rant of religious associations to the simplicity and consistency 
of truth; and when ideas and opinions have this warrant, it 
does not require the verification of the senses to make the con- 
clusions of Philosophy acceptable and true to the religious in- 
stincts. To educe conclusions acceptable to these instincts and 
in opposition to no known truth, — in other words, to free relig- 
ious beliefs from contradictions and to give them consistency, — 
was the aspiration and the devoted service of Philosophy. 

Philosophy has in fact three phases instead of two. For 
as Theology was a speculation prosecuted in the interest of re- 
ligious feeling, and Metaphysics a speculation in defense or 
criticism of the doctrines of Theology, so Criticism or Critical 
Philosophy is an examination of metaphysical conclusions. 
But the latter is properly, in its motives, a scientific specula- 
tion. Such is the true logical order of Philosophy proper, 
though all these phases may and do co-exist in history. 

It is the opinion of many modern thinkers, besides the so- 
called Positivists, or avowed followers of M. Comte, that sci- 
ence, as we have defined it, or truth pursued simply in the in- 
terests of a rational curiosity, and for the mental discipline and 
the material utilities of its processes and conclusions, will here- 
after occupy more and more the attention of mankind, to the 
exclusion of the older philosophy. It is also the opinion of 
these thinkers, that this is not to be regretted, but rather wel- 
comed as a step forward in the advancement of human welfare 
and civilization ; that the pursuit of science and its utilities is 
capable of inspiring as great and earnest a devotion as those 
which religious interests have inspired, and which have hitherto 



54 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



determined the destinies of mankind and given form to human 
thought, and one vastly more beneficent. 

Whatever foundations there are for these opinions, it is cer- 
tain that the claims of science, as a new power in the world, to 
the regard of thoughtful and earnest men, are receiving a re- 
newed and more candid attention. Through its recent prog- 
ress, many of the questions which have hitherto remained in 
the arena of metaphysical disputation are brought forward in 
new forms and under new auspices. Scientific investigations 
promise to throw a flood of light on subjects which have inter- 
ested mankind since the beginning of speculation, — subjects 
related to universal human interests. History, society, laws, 
and morality, — all are claimed as topics with which scientific 
methods are competent to deal. Scientific solutions' are pro- 
posed to all the questions of philosophy which scientific illumi- 
nation may not show to have their origin in metaphysical hal- 
lucination. 

Prominent in the ranks of the new school stands Mr. Her- 
bert Spencer, whose versatility has already given to the world 
many ingenious and original essays in this new philosophy, 
and whose aspiring genius projects many more, which, if his 
strength does not fail, are to develop the capacities of a scien- 
tific method in dealing with all the problems that .ought legiti- 
mately to interest the human mind. 

The programme of his future labors which his publishers 
have advertised might dispose a prejudiced critic to look with 
suspicion on what he has already accomplished; but the fa- 
vorable impression which his works have" made, and the plaud- 
its of an admiring public, demand a suspension of judgment; 
and the extravagance of his pretensions should for the present 
be credited to the strength of his enthusiasm. 

It is through the past labors of an author that we must 
judge of his qualifications for future work, and the complete- 
ness of his preparation. Mr. Spencer's writings evince an ex- 
tensive knowledge of facts political and scientific, but extensive 
rather than profound, and mainly at second hand. It is not, of 
course, to be expected that a philosopher will be an original 
investigator in all the departments of knowledge with which 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 



55 



he is obliged to have dealings. He must take much at second 
hand. But original investigations in some department of 
empirical science are a discipline which best tests and develops 
even a philosopher's powers. He has in this at least an ex- 
perience of what is requisite to an adequate comprehension 
of facts. He learns how to make knowledge profitable to the 
ascertainment of new truths, — an art in which the modern 
natural philosopher excels. By new truths must be under- 
stood such as are not implied in what we already know, or 
educible from what is patent to common observation. How- 
ever skillfully the philosopher may apply his analytical proc- 
esses to the abstraction of the truths involved in patent facts, 
the utility of his results will depend not so much on their 
value and extent as mere abstractions, as on their capacity to 
enlarge our experience by bringing to notice residual phenom- 
ena, and making us observe what w r e have entirely overlooked, 
or search out what has eluded our observation. Such is the 
character of the principles of modern natural philosophy, 
both mathematical and physical. They are rather the eyes 
with which nature is seen, than the elements and constituents 
of the objects discovered. It was in a clear apprehension 
of this value in the principles of mathematical and experi- 
mental science, that the excellence of Newton's genius con- 
sisted • and it is this value which the Positive Philosophy most 
prize's. But this is not the value which we find in Mr. Spen- 
cer's speculations. 

Mr. Spencer is not a positivist, though that was not a very 
culpable mistake which confounded his speculations with the 
writings of this school. Tor however much he differs from the 
positivists in his methods and opinions, he is actuated by the 
same confidence in the capacities of a scientific method, and 
by the same disrespect for the older philosophies. Mr. Spen- 
cer applies a method for the ascertainment of ultimate truths, 
which a positivist would regard as correct only on the suppo- 
sition that the materials of truth have all been collected, and 
that the research of science is no longer for the enlargement 
of our experience or for the informing of the mind. Until 
these conditions be realized, the positivist regards such at- 



5 6 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

tempts as Mr. Spencer's as not only faulty, but positively per- 
nicious and misleading. Nothing justifies the development 
of abstract principles in science but their utility in enlarging 
our concrete knowledge of nature. The ideas on which 
mathematical Mechanics and the Calculus are founded, the 
morphological ideas of Natural History, and the theories of 
Chemistry are such working ideas, — finders, not merely sum- 
maries of truth. 

But before examining more in detail Mr. Spencer's method 
of philosophizing, it will be useful to consider his career and 
character as a thinker and writer. Born in Derby in 1820, he 
was educated by his father, who was a school-teacher in that 
town, and by his uncle, a clergyman of the Established 
Church. At the age of seventeen he entered on the profes- 
sion of civil engineering, which he followed for eight years. 
He then abandoned this pursuit for a literary career. He had 
already published in a scientific journal several papers on pro- 
fessional subjects, and at the age of twenty-two gave an ear- 
nest of his tastes for political speculation in a newspaper 
article on "The Proper Sphere of Government." He after- 
wards became a writer in the Economist, and in 1851 pub- 
lished his "Social Statics, or the Conditions essential to 
Human Happiness specified, and the First of them devel- 
oped." By this work he became first generally known to the 
reading public in America. This work exhibits the traits 
which characterize all Mr. Spencer's subsequent writings. A 
constant and close student of facts both political and scientific, 
with the practical bent of the English radical and idealist, 
he is none the less strongly attracted to the abstractions of 
speculative thought. He aims at the same time at system 
and at effect. No distract idealist, though always actuated 
by that uncontent which moves revolutions and reforms, he 
uses abstractions and abstract modes of thought for moral 
ends, His allegiance to his speculative and his practical aims 
seems sometimes divided, and then he shows a tendency to 
follow out the consequences of theory, and to trust the welfare 
of mankind to its omnipotent care. He has great faith in the 
self-sufficingness of things. The very elements have in them 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 57 

the seeds of moral perfectibility. But he would leave out of 
the category of natural agencies in politics the paternal care 
of the rulers of mankind. He regards with lofty scorn that 
presumption in the governing classes which pretends to com- 
prehend and help forward the inherent progressiveness of the 
world. Moral idealism colors all Mr. Spencer's views, both in 
science and politics. This gains him a popular hearing, es- 
pecially with the youth of democratic America. But Amer- 
ican democracy itself sympathizes with English radicalism only 
as the rich and benevolent sympathize with the poor. We 
wish them the good of universal suffrage. We are studying 
how to remedy the evils of it. To us this boon is a present 
fate, mixed of good and evil, — a thing neither to seek nor to 
avoid, but of which we must make the best. We suffer our 
legislators to exercise that absolute tyranny which Mr. Spencer 
proves to be an absolute immorality, — a compulsory universal 
common-school education, — without a murmur. We have not 
even suspected its immorality. Some of us regard it as a little 
overdone; but few or none have found that the system is 
radically faulty, though it be at variance with Mr. Spencer's 
moral premises. But we must defer the consideration of the 
arguments of this work, for we are at present only concerned 
with the characteristics of the writer. 

The strong tendency to speculative and abstract modes of 
thought which his first work evinces found a more distinct 
utterance in the author's " Principles of Psychology," published 
four years later, in 1855. The choice of this subject seems to 
have been determined by the author's genius for the kind of 
thinking to which this subject is adapted, rather than by any 
special training in its literature. Indeed, this work, like the 
" Social Statics," is characterized by great originality. Con- 
strained by his entire sympathy with modern movements in 
thought and scientific culture, he is perforce a scientific em- 
piricist, though his peculiar genius would have found a more 
congenial employment in scholastic philosophy. Mr. Spen- 
cer believes in developments. All his writings are develop- 
ments, and most of them are about developments. He de- 
lights in "evolutions from the homogeneous to the heterogene- 



58 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



ous," — in " changes from an indefinite incoherent homogeneity 
to a definite coherent heterogeneity, through continuous differ- 
entiations and integrations." He not only discovers them in 
all the objects of scientific research, but he rings these changes 
in all his discourses on them. Analysis is his forte, and devel- 
opments are foibles. But he had not yet in his "Principles of 
Psychology" fully developed these foibles. He finds, however, 
in the problems of Psychology scope for his analytical powers. 
Like all writers who do not speak from the urgency of con- 
viction or dissent, he is an eclectic. He aims to combine in his 
Psychology what is true in empiricism with what is true in 
metaphysics ; and he had special reasons for this course. Mr. 
Spencer is here no longer a champion. His moral convictions 
find their utterance in his political and social essays. In Phi- 
losophy he is charmed with ideas, and with his power to un- 
ravel them. He is actuated by a simple love of truth, and he 
is therefore an eclectic. He has no real respect for ideas or 
for the religious grounds of metaphysics. As between pure 
empiricism and religious metaphysics his choice would be un- 
hesitating. He would choose empiricism. But ideas are fine 
things when one has more power to unfold than to find them ; 
and they are still found, as heretofore, by the insights of scien- 
tific sagacity rather than by any method. Pure empiricism, 
however, or Positivism, refuses to Psychology any place in the 
hierarchy of the sciences. How then can Mr. Spencer get the 
ideas on which to exercise his powers ? There is only one 
course ; he must postulate them. Ideas are all derived from 
experience, it is true ; but we must not seek in actual particu- 
lar experiences for their validity. These may be, and probably 
are, beyond the reach of resuscitation. What then is the test 
of truth or of reality in the grounds of any idea ? " The in- 
conceivableness of its negation," says Mr. Spencer; and so he 
adopted a principle from metaphysics, but with a limitation. 
This inconceivableness results from the discipline of experience. 
It does not depend on any plastic power of the mind as an 
original nature, determining the possibilities of experience and 
thought, but it is determined in the mind by invariable experi- 
ences. Those orders and relationships of events in nature 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 



59 



which are present to the mind from its first determinations to 
thought, those which are never contradicted in experience, de- 
termine also the possibilities of thought ; and in turn the possi- 
bilities of thought are tests of invariable experiences, though 
the particular experiences are lost in oblivion. In other words, 
the mind has but one faculty peculiarly its own, and that is 
memory. The mind is pure memory, but this has various 
forms. The primordial memory, the intellect, that which is as 
it were the framework of all the others, — the containing mem- 
ory, — consists of certain beliefs, the negations of which cannot 
be conceived, but the particular grounds of which are forgot- 
ten. This memory extends back of the individual life, is de- 
rived from the experience of the race, and constitutes the in- 
nate tendencies and mental powers with which the individual 
life begins. This sounds like Plato's doctrine, that learning 
is a kind of reminiscence ; but it is in fact pure empiricism. 
Mind is but a reflex of organism. But the organism has a 
memory, — a memory of the results of all invariable experiences 
in the continuous evolutions of the race. No empiricist can 
find any radical fault with this account of innate ideas. 

But Mr. Spencer evolves it in a somewhat different manner. 
He is seeking for a basis of psychology which shall be consist- 
ent with the truth of empiricism, and at the same time- with 
the possibility of psychology as a distinct science. Some first 
truth or truths peculiarly psychological are wanted, for Mr. 
Spencer proposes to try his speculative powers in eliciting what 
has eluded the sagacity of his predecessors in psychology, — in 
the analysis of ideas. Now, the existence of beliefs, proved to 
be invariable by the inconceivableness of their negations, is a 
fundamental fact of consciousness, — the most fundamental 
fact. Beliefs of all sorts are the constituent elements of con- 
. sciousness. Every act of the mind involves a judgment, that 
is, a belief; and the only test, indeed the only meaning, of 
the truth of a belief is \Xs persistency . Hence in variableness in 
a belief, as proved by the inconceivableness of its negation, is 
the highest possible warrant of truth. Sensible experience can 
give no higher warrant. The mind, therefore, contains in 
itself the criterion of truth j and psychology, or a scientific 



60 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

evolution of the data of consciousness, is a legitimate philoso- 
phy. And this is thought to be not inconsistent with the em- 
pirical explanation of the origin of invariable beliefs, namely, 
the formation of the mind by invariable, often repeated, special 
experiences, both in the individual and in the race. But there 
is a superfluity somewhere, — too many authorities. Occam's 
razor is not too old to apply to this new philosophy. The 
characteristic common to particular, real experiences, and to 
universal, necessary truths, so called, — namely, that they are 
believed, and believed without appeal to anything else, — this 
characteristic is either from the same or from different sources. 
If from different sources, then empiricism is false, and Psy- 
chology is a legitimate philosophy. If from the same source, 
namely, particular experiences, then these are a sufficient au- 
thority, and indeed the only final appeal, though invariable 
beliefs, "proved to be invariable by the inconceivableness of 
their negations," may be excellent approximate determinations 
of what experience certifies. No empiricist will deny this ex- 
cellence to natural beliefs, but this is not ascribing to them any 
proper authority. 

In discussing this his criterion or " universal postulate," Mr. 
Spencer encounters two of the acutest of modern thinkers, 
Mr. Mill and Sir William Hamilton, whose opinions he finds 
opposed to his own on opposite grounds. Here is a fine 
chance for eclecticism, to combine what is true in both these 
philosophies ; but first he must refute what is false. 

Speaking of the effect of habit in determining the limits of 
our conceptive faculty, Mr. Mill says : " There are remarkable 
instances of this in the history of science ; instances in which 
the wisest men rejected as impossible, because inconceivable, 
things which their posterity, by earlier practice and longer 
perseverance in the attempt, found it quite easy to conceive, 
and which everybody now knows to be true." While grant- 
ing that this evidence is sufficient to disprove the doctrine of 
the a priori character of our natural beliefs, our author thinks 
that "it does not really warrant Mr. Mill's inference, that it 
is absurd to reject a proposition as impossible on no other 
grounds than its inconceivableness." Further on he says: 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 6 1 

" If there be, as Mr. Mill holds, certain absolute uniformities in nat- 
ure; if these uniformities produce, as they must, absolute uniformities 
in our experience ; and if, as he shows, these absolute uniformities in 
our experience disable us from conceiving the negations of them, — then, 
answering to each uniformity in nature which we can cognize, there 
must exist in us a belief of which the negation is inconceivable, and which 
is absolutely true. In this wide range of cases subjective inconceivable- 
ness must correspond to objective impossibility. Further experience will 
produce correspondence where it may not yet exist ; and we may expect the 
correspondence to become ultimately complete. In nearly all cases this 
test of inconceivableness must be valid now ; and where it is not, it still 
expresses the net result of our experience up to the present time ; which 
is the most that any test can do." 

True, — the most that any empirical test can do ; but is not 
Mr. Spencer's test, " the universal postulate," exempt from this 
imperfection ? If not, how does it warrant rejecting as impos- 
sible an inconceivable proposition, on no other ground than its 
inconceivableness ? Mr. Spencer's argument, condensed and 
completed, is this. If there be any such things as universal 
necessary truths, then invariable beliefs must result from them ; 
but we have invariable beliefs, therefore they must be the tests 
of truth ! If A exists, then B exists ; but B exists, therefore — 
Mr. Spencer must find the conclusion in his own logic : neither 
Modus Foncns nor Modus Tollens will serve. 

"But," he continues, "the inconsistency into which Mr. Mill has thus 
fallen is most clearly seen in the second of his two chapters on 'Dem- 
onstration and Necessary Truths.' He admits in this the validity of 
proof by a rednclio ad absurdum. Now what is a reduclio ad absurdum, 
unless a reduction to inconceivableness ? And why, if inconceivableness 
be in other cases an insufficient ground for rejecting a proposition as im- 
possible, is it a sufficient ground in this case ? " 

After quoting other passages from Mill, Mr. Spencer says of 
them : 

"Here, and throughout the whole of his argument, Mr. Mill assumes 
that there is something more certain in a demonstration than in anything 
else, — some necessary truth in the steps of our reasoning which is not 
possessed by the axioms they start from. How can this assumption be 
justified ? In each successive syllogism, the dependence of the conclusion 
upon its premises is a truth of which we have no other proof than the in- 
conceivability of the negation. Unless our perception of logical truth is 
a priori, which Mr. Mill will not contend, it too, like our perceptions of 
mathematical truth, has been gained from experience," etc. 



62 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

Now all this shows a grand confusion in Mr. Spencer's mind. 
He bases his postulate, the ultimate test of all truth, on two 
hypotheses, — the existence of universal facts or absolute uni- 
formities in nature, and their effect in producing invariable 
beliefs in the mind ; and because Mr. Mill allows these as em- 
pirical generalizations, he is regarded as inconsistent in not 
allowing the character of necessity to an imperfect conclusion 
from them ! But Mr. Mill does not deny to natural beliefs a 
proximate or derivative authority. Both logical axioms and the 
axioms to which they are applied in reasoning may safely be 
taken as properly accredited from experience ; but their author- 
ity is secondary, and such authority is not always to be trusted, 
as Mr. Mill's historical example shows. The imperfect argu- 
ment, " If A, then B, but B," proves nothing absolutely, but 
it may determine a probability. Mr. Mill maintains that there 
are degrees of trustworthiness in natural beliefs, as well as in 
the so-called empirical beliefs, and that this trustworthiness 
depends absolutely, not on the strength of our beliefs, whether 
this be absolute or not, but on particular experiences, ultimately 
and absolutely. 

Mr. Spencer endeavors to explain away Mill's historical ex- 
ample, — the fact that certain Greek philosophers could not 
credit the existence of antipodes, — by the consideration that 
the conception, which seemed impossible to these philosophers, 
is really a complex one, whereas the truths which are properly 
attested by the inconceivableness of their negations are sim- 
ple "undecomposable" ones. He therefore puts a modifying 
clause into his canon. It is necessary that the ideas so tested 
be simple. The mind in the confusion of compound ideas may 
think that it conceives what it really does not conceive, and that 
it cannot conceive what it really can conceive. The certainty 
of the application of the test depends on the number of really 
independent applications which it involves, in each of which 
the mind is liable to a slip of the attention. Mistakes from a 
-•con fusion of matters are quite independent of the essential 
trustworthiness of our primary sources of knowledge. Even 
the senses may get confused. Why not, then, our invariable 
ideas ? Easily : for does not Mr. Spencer himself confound the 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 6$ 

authority of our natural beliefs with their utility in directing us 
to what our experiejices certify ? 

Mr. Spencer is mistaken in supposing that any middle 
ground is possible between empiricism and metaphysics, or 
that the characteristic ideas of these two philosophies can be 
reconciled by the hypothesis of organized experiences, anterior 
to the life of the individual mind. In these experiences, as in 
those of the individual life, particular facts are the real author- 
ities, as is evinced by what Mr. Spencer cannot deny, that such 
facts are competent to overthrow the most settled beliefs. It 
avails nothing to say that such facts cannot be experienced, 
the mind being, ex hypothesis unable to conceive them even if 
they exist ; for this is to convict natural beliefs and the mind 
itself of incompetency, not to establish these beliefs as compe- 
tent authorities. 

In reviewing previous attempts to find an independent basis 
for Psychology, Mr. Spencer encounters Sir William Hamil- 
ton's philosophy of Common-Sense. After quoting Hamilton's 
leading maxims, that "Consciousness is to be presumed trust- 
worthy until proved to be mendacious," and that "the men-' 
dacity of consciousness is proved, if its data immediately in 
themselves, or mediately in their necessary consequences, be 
shown to stand in mutual contradiction," he says: 

" Now a sceptic might very properly argue that this test is worthless. 
For as the steps by which consciousness is to be proved mendacious are 
themselves states of consciousness ; and as they must be assumed trust- 
worthy in the act of proving that consciousness i's not so ; the process 
results in assuming the trustworthiness of particular states of conscious- 
ness, to prove the mendacity of consciousness in general. Or to apply 
the test specifically: — Let it be shown that two data of consciousness 
stand in contradiction. Then consciousness is mendacious. But if con- 
sciousness is mendacious, then the consciousness of this consciousness is 
mendacious. Then consciousness is trustworthy. And so on forever." 

But the condition of vacillation to which Mr. Spencer re- 
duces the sceptic's application of Hamilton's criterion is itself 
the true condition of scepticism. Mr. Spencer seems to mean 
by scepticism a dogmatic scepticism, — if we may be allowed 
the expression, — or a negative dogmatism ; whereas Hamilton 
means by scepticism a negation of all philosophical judgments, 



64 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

the " what do I know ? " condition of a mind confused about 
authorities; and Mr. Spencer has really given an excellent 
illustration of the application of these maxims, while seeking 
to depreciate their value. But the condition of scepticism is 
best illustrated by the original of the sophism to which he rer 
duces Hamilton's maxims. " If you say that you lie, and say 
so truly, then you do lie; but if you say so falsely, then you 
speak the truth. In either case, therefore, the same statement 
is both true and false." To the fearful consequences of such 
lying is the sceptic reduced who doubts the testimony of con- 
sciousness. Mr. Spencer gives to this sophism the more com- 
mon but inferior form, of which the original is this : " All 
Cretans are liars. But Epimenides, who says this, is himself a 
Cretan. Therefore, as he is a liar, this saying is not true. 
But if the saying is not true, Epimenides may have spoken the 
truth. Then the saying is true : — and so on as before." In 
his singular misapprehension of the meaning of the word " scep- 
ticism" in philosophy, Mr. Spencer illustrates another trait of 
his writings. He means by '-sceptic" one who doubts the 
essential doctrines of orthodox philosophy, "natural realism," 
"personal identity," "the possibility of a science of psychol- 
ogy," and the like; and as he is opposed to such sceptics, he 
gives the impression to the world that he is ranged on the side 
of orthodoxy. But it is only with the husks of orthodoxy that 
he feeds his flock. He does not defend its doctrines as Ham- 
ilton did in the interests of dogmatic theology and religion, 
but simply from the vanity of disputation. 

It cannot be said of Hamilton's criterion, that it is of any 
greater value than Mr. Spencer's, or that it yields anything 
more as a principle of research, but it at least has the merits 
of self-consistency and distinctness. 

In reviewing the objections to the test of inconceivableness, 
Mr. Spencer again finds himself opposed to Sir William Ham- 
ilton. The doughty knight is encased in a seemingly invulner- 
able logic, and impedes the progress of truth. After stating 
certain minor and indecisive objections to the doctrine of the 
"conditioned," Mr. Spencer waives them. 

•' Granting ail this," he says, "Sir William Hamilton's argument may 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 65 

still be met. He says that inconceivability is no criterion of impossi- 
bility. Why ? Because of two propositions, one of which must be true ; 
it proves both impossible, — it proves that space cannot have a limit, be- 
cause a limit is inconceivable, and yet that it has a limit, because unlimited 
space is inconceivable ; it proves, therefore, that space has a limit and has 
no limit, which is absurd. How absurd? Absurd because 'it is impos- 
sible for the same thing to be and not to be. ' But how do we know that 
it is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be ? What is our 
criterion of this impossibility? Can Sir William Hamilton assign any 
other than this same inconceivability ? If not, his argument is self- 
destructive ; seeing that he assumes the validity of the test in proving its 
invalidity." 

This is the same shaft ad hominem which Mr. Spencer lev- 
eled at Mill, and it glances for the same reason. He does not 
precisely apprehend the position of his antagonist. Hamilton's 
argument is not self-destructive, since it is only designed to 
prove the incompleteness of the test, which Mr. Spencer has 
adopted in its baldest and crudest form. What was an obvi- 
ous petitio pincipii as applied to Mr. Mill, namely, ascribing 
to him the opinion that logical axioms rest ultimately on the 
test of the inconceivableness of their negations, is none the 
less really such as applied to Hamilton's doctrines. Ham- 
ilton can and does assign a different criterion. Mr. Mill ap- 
peals to particular experiences as the tests, in the proper sense 
of that word, of all axioms logical or mathematical ; while 
Hamilton admits for them a psychological test, analogous to 
Mr. Spencer's, yet more complete. "A proposition which can 
be conceived, but of which the negation cannot be conceived, 
is true, and its negation is false," is the complete formula. 

The conceivable and inconceivable correspond to the possible 
and impossible only when logically opposed to each other. If 
two conceivables could be logically opposed to each other, we 
should have scepticism in the philosophical sense of the word, 
or as Hamilton uses it. If two inconceivables are logically op- 
posed, we have no test of true or false ; yet not that vacillation 
of the mind, that uncertainty, which is the characteristic of 
scepticism. But we have the feeling that there is truth beyond 
the power of knowledge, or that "the domain of our knowl- 
edge is not co-extensive with the horizon of our faith;" for 
a principle of truth — the principle of non-contradiction — is 



66 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

seen to extend where sense and imagination and our powers 
of conception cannot follow. This decides nothing positively. 
It only shows that unbelief or negative dogmatism is unfound- 
ed, and it opens the way for the authority of religious feeling, 
in whose behalf the contests of philosophy are undertaken by 
all but such pretended champions as Mr. Spencer. Hamilton 
went to the extremest verge in the direction of empiricism 
which it was possible to reach, without renouncing the inter- 
ests for which philosophy proper has always been cultivated. 
Empiricism has other interests, worthy interests, but they are 
not religious. 

It was necessary to a philosophical defense of religious doc- 
trines to establish logical axioms on a broader basis than ex- 
perience can afford, in order to secure a ground for belief in 
truths which are inconceivable, or truths of which the terms 
cannot be united in a judgment either by proofs from what is 
really known or by intuition; and in order also to reason about 
such truths, and bring the objects of religious feeling, partially 
at least, within the scope of our thoughts. Such are the mo- 
tives for metaphysical philosophy, and such indeed are the only 
grounds for metaphysics. Philosophy converts practical rea- 
sons or final causes into theoretical reasons, and postulates a 
faculty where there is only a feeling. But after all, that which 
the Best in us most prizes is not so much the service of Phi- 
losophy as that for which this service is undertaken. 

Mr. Spencer pursues his discussion of this subject in the first 
part of his recently published work, the " First Principles of a 
New System of Philosophy," to the consideration of which we 
shall presently come. Of his further developments in Psy- 
chology we can only say that they are very wearisome. He 
makes little explicit use of his postulate ; for this, after all, is 
only a license to take any ideas one chooses for the bases of 
science, if one only cannot conceive their negations. It is one 
of those unproductive principles which Positivism condemns; 
and he develops others equally useless, except in the mental 
discipline there may be in following their evolution. One such 
application of his method is in search of a definition of Life, 
which after a development in as many pages results in these 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 67 

words : " Life is defined as — The definite combination of 
heterogeneous changes, both simultaneous and successive, in 
correspondence with external co-existences and sequences." 
These words are sufficiently abstract to be of some scientific 
service, but they only make Life the more perplexing, which 
had mysteries enough before. But we ought not to prejudge. 
Perhaps Mr. Spencer will be able, when he comes to treat of 
Morality in his new philosophy, to apply this definition in 
elucidating the principles of correct living. 

But to return to the argument of his " Social Statics." This is 
a thorough-going application of one of the conditions of human 
happiness to all the relations of human life,— namely, the Law 
of Liberty, or the " Let alone Principle." To warrant the ex- 
clusive application of this principle to the deduction of social 
laws and the limits of state powers, he postulates it as a part 
or one side of a perfect law, of which we have knowledge 
through a moral sense. This sense has not an a priori char- 
acter, as the metaphysicians maintain, but is derived from the 
observation, by the human race as a whole, of the conditions 
essential to human happiness on the whole, and is developed 
in our nature with the evolution of civilization, as the instinct 
which cares for the interests of society, just as the bodily appe- 
tites are produced to care for the interests of the individual 
organism. This doctrine is perfectly analogous to that which 
he develops more explicitly in the "Principles of Psychology " 
concerning the origin and character of natural beliefs. He 
makes the same mistake in basing a criterion on an hypothesis, 
and he is inconsistent in the same way in ascribing to his 
"moral sense" an original authority. With the exception of 
these errors, there is nothing in his doctrine of moral sense 
with which the utilitarian can find fault. But he develops his 
ideas in this his earlier work so inexplicitly, that not only Mr. 
Mill,* but many others, have mistaken him for an opponent of 
utilitarianism. By ascribing an absolute authority to intellect- 
ual and moral ideas, when on his principles he ought only to 
have ascribed to them a relative and derivative one, he was led 
into mistakes which have given rise to misinterpretations of his 



See Essay on Utilitarianism. 



68 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

doctrines, — misinterpretations of which he cannot justly com- 
plain. But he has also gained a reputation for orthodoxy, 
which he does not deserve. 

Mr. Spencer succeeds better in his shorter essays, many of 
which for ingenuity, originality, and scientific interest have 
been rarely surpassed. But judging only by his writing 
and the general character of his thinking, we should not 
ascribe to him that precision in the apprehension of scien- 
tific facts which comes chiefly from a successful cultivation 
of experimental and mathematical research in natural history 
and natural philosophy. To learn only the results of such 
researches and the general character of their processes is 
not enough. One must also be qualified to pursue them. 
The fact that Mr. Spencer was at one time a civil engineer 
seems to militate against this judgment of his qualifications. 
But though a marked success and a reputation acquired 
in this pursuit would be of great weight in determining our 
judgment, yet, in the absence of any evidence of this kind, we 
adhere to the opinion we have formed from his writings. We 
will say nothing of the impossibility of any one man's acquiring 
adequately all the knowledge requisite for the successful ac- 
complishment of such an undertaking as Mr. Spencer has pro- 
posed for himself. 

But a part of this work has become an accomplished fact. 
The "First Principles" of the new system of philosophy has 
appeared, and a serial publication of parts of another work on 
the "Principles of Biology" is now in progress. Mr. Spencer 
modestly omits from his gigantic scheme any special consider- 
ation of physics or the principles of inorganic nature ; although 
his training in mathematics and engineering would seem at first 
sight to be a preparation best suited to this subject. Perhaps 
he regards this science as standing in little need of his develop- 
ments, and besides he has already published some of his views 
on this subject in his essay on the Nebular Hypothesis, and 
his "First Principles" involve generalizations from physical 
theories. 

To the positivists the sciences of general physics, that is As- 
tronomy, Mechanical and Chemical Physics, and Chemistry, 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 69 

afford the patterns for all the sciences, and some, like Physiol- 
ogy/ are beginning to profit by such examples. But Mr. Spen- 
cer does not find in general physics free play for his ideas. It 
is only in what constitutes the problems and obscurities of these 
sciences that he finds free exemplifications of his principles. 
In the nebular hypothesis and in the obscure relations of phys- 
ical forces to organic life, and in. the hypothesis of the develop- 
ment of organic life through successive geological eras, he is 
at home. He is conscious of the temptation there is to im- 
pose teleological interpretations upon the obscurities of science; 
and he therefore aims to free his speculations as much as possi- 
ble from these biases, but with as little success as he had in his 
Psychology in correcting the errors of metaphysics by the light 
of empirical science. 

The idea which has exercised the profoundest influence on 
the course of Mr. Spencer's thought, as well as on all thought 
in modern times, and one which appears more or less distinct- 
ly in nearly all of Mr. Spencer's writings, is the idea which he 
elaborates in his " First Principles " as the " Law of Evolution.'-' 
But what is the origin and value of this idea ? Ostensibly it 
was derived from the investigations of the physiologists in em- 
bryology, from Harvey down to the present time. The formula 
of Von Baer was the first adequate statement of it. This for- 
mula Mr. Spencer has elaborated and completed, so as to apply, 
he thinks, not only to the phenomena of embryology, but to the 
phenomena of nature generally, and especially, as it appears, to 
those which we know least about, and to those which we only 
guess at. 

But while this is the ostensible origin and scientific value of 
this idea, its real origin is a very curious and instructive fact in 
human nature. Progress is a grand idea, — Universal Progress 
is a still grander idea. It strikes the key-note of modern civil- 
ization. Moral idealism is the religion of our times. What 
the ideas God, the One and the All, the Infinite First Cause, 
were to an earlier civilization, such are Progress and Universal 
Progress to the modern world, — a reflex of its moral ideas and 
feelings, and not a tradition. Men ever worship the Best, and 
the consciousness that the Best is attainable is the highest moral 



7 o 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



consciousness, the most inspiring of truths. And when in- 
dications of that attainment are visible not merely to the eye 
of faith, but in sensible progress, scientifically measurable, civ- 
ilization is inspired with a new devotion. Faith that moral per- 
fectibility is possible, not in remote times and places, not in the 
millennium, not in heaven, but in the furtherance of a present 
progress, is a faith which to possess in modern times does not 
make a man suspected, of folly or fanaticism. He may forget 
the past, cease to be religious in the conventional sense of the 
word, but he is the modern prophet. 

When Plato forsook the scientific studies of his youth, and 
found the truest interpretations of nature by asking his own 
mind what was the best, according to which, he felt sure, the 
order and framework of nature must be determined, he did but 
illustrate the influence which strongly impressed moral ideas 
have on speculative thought at all times ; but he did it con- 
sciously and avow r edly. Modern thinkers may be less conscious 
of this influence, may endeavor to suppress what consciousness 
they have of it, warned by the history of philosophy that tele- 
ological speculations are exploded follies ; nevertheless, the in- 
fluence surrounds and penetrates them like an atmosphere, un- 
less they be moral phlegmatics and mere lookers-on. 

It was Mr. Spencer's aim to free the law of evolution from 
all teleological implications, and to add such elements and lim- 
itations to its definition as should make it universally applica- 
ble to the movement of nature. Having done this, as he thinks, 
he arrives at the following definition : " Evolution is a change 
from an indefinite incoherent homogeneity to a definite coherent 
heterogeneity through continuous differentiations and integra- 
tions." But teleology is a-.subtile poison, and lurks where least 
suspected. The facts of the sciences which Dr. Whewell calls 
palsetiological, like the various branches of geology, and every 
actual concrete series of events which together form an object 
of interest to us, are apt, unless we are fully acquainted with 
the actual details through observation or by actual particular 
deductions from well-known particular facts and general laws, 
to fall into a dramatic procession in our imaginations. The 
mythic instinct slips into the place of the chronicles at every 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 



71 



opportunity. All history is written on dramatic principles. All 
cosmological speculations are strictly teleological. We never 
can comprehend the whole of a concrete series of events. 
What arrests our attention in it is what constitutes the parts of 
an order either real or imaginary, and all merely imaginary or- 
ders are dramatic, or are determined by interests which are 
spontaneous in human life. Our speculations about what we 
have not really observed, to which we supply the order and 
most of the facts, are necessarily determined by some principle 
of order in our minds. Now the most general principle which 
we can have is this : that the concrete series shall be an in- 
telligible series in its entirety ; thus alone can it interest and 
attract our thoughts and arouse a rational curiosity. 

But to suppose that such series exist anywhere but where 
observation and legitimate particular inferences from observa- 
tion warrant the supposition, is to commit the same mistake 
which has given rise to teleological theories of nature. The 
"law of causation," the postulate of positive science, does not 
go to this extent. It does not suppose that there are through- 
out nature unbroken series in causation, forming in their en- 
tirety intelligible wholes, determinable in their beginnings, 
their progressions, and their ends, with a birth, a growth, a 
maturation, and a decay. It only presumes that the perhaps 
unintelligible wholes, both in the sequences and the co-exist- 
ences of natural phenomena, are composed of intelligible ele- 
ments ; that chaos does not subsist at the heart of things ; that 
the order in nature which is discernible vaguely even to the 
unobservant implies at least a precise elementary order, or fixed 
relations of antecedents and consequents in its ultimate parts 
and constituents ; that the apparently irregular heterogeneous 
masses, the concrete series" of events, are crystalline in their 
substance. 

To discover these elementary fixed relations of antecedents 
and consequents, is the work of scientific induction ; and the 
only postulate of science is, that these relations are everywhere 
to be found. To account, as far as possible, for any concrete 
order, intelligible as a whole, or regular, like that of life, is the 
work of scientific explanation, by deductions from the element- 



72 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



ary fixed relations which induction may have discovered. 
But to explain any such order by simply defining it externally 
in vague, abstract terms, and to postulate such orders as the 
components of nature and parts of one complete and intelligi- 
ble order, is to take a step in advance of legitimate speculation, 
and a step backward in scientific method, — is to commit the 
mistake of the ancient philosophies of nature. 

But Mr. Spencer thinks he has established his "Law of Evo- 
lution" by induction. The examples from which he has an- 
alyzed his law, the examples of progress in the development 
of the several elements of civilization, such as languages, laws, 
fashions, and ideas, — the hypothetical examples of the Nebular 
Hypothesis and the Development Hypothesis, and the example 
of embryological development (the only one our conceptions 
of which are not liable to be tainted by teleological biases), — 
are examples which, according to Mr. Spencer's philosophy, 
afford both the definition and its justification. In other words, 
his definitions are only carefully elaborated general descriptions 
in abstract terms ; or statements of facts which are observed in 
numerous instances or classes of instances, in terms detached 
from all objects, in abstract terms, of which the intension is 
fully known, but of which the extension is unknown except 
through the descriptions they embody. This, though a useful, 
is a precarious kind of induction, and is apt to lead to prema- 
ture and false generalizations, or extensions of descriptions to 
what is hypothetical or unknown. Such inductions are liable 
to be mistaken for another sort, and to be regarded as not 
merely general, but universal descriptions, and as applicable to 
what they do not really apply to. This liability is strong just 
in proportion as prominence is given to such definitions in a 
philosophical system. No convert to Mr. Spencer's philosophy 
doubts the substantial correctness of the Nebular and Devel- 
opment Hypotheses, though these are only hypothetical ex- 
amples of Mr. Spencer's law. 

The other surt of inductions to which we have referred are 
peculiar to the exact inductive sciences. Facts which are not 
merely general, but, from their elementary character and their 
immediate relations to the orderliness of nature, are presumed 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 



73 



to be universal facts, are the sort which the positive philosophy 
most prizes, and of which the law of gravitation is the typical 
example. The honor must be conceded to Mr. Spencer of hav- 
ing elaborated a precise and very abstract description of cer- 
tain phenomena, the number, the other characters, and the ex- 
tent of which are, however, unknown, but are all the more 
imposing from this circumstance. 

The law of gravity was a key which deciphered a vast body 
of otherwise obscure phenomena, and (what is more to the 
purpose) was successfully applied to the solution of all the 
problems these phenomena presented. It is common to ascribe 
to Newton the merit of having discovered the law of gravity, in 
the same sense in which Mr. Spencer may be said to have dis- 
covered his law. The justness of this praise may well be doubt- 
ed ; for others had speculated and defined the law of gravity 
before Newton. What he really discovered was the universality 
of this law, or so nearly discovered it that the astronomers 
who completed the investigation did not hesitate to concede to 
him the full honor. He established for it such a degree of 
probability that his successors pursued the verification with un- 
hesitating confidence, and still pursue it, in the fullness of faith. 
- Mr. Spencer's law is founded on examples, of which only one 
class, the facts of embryology, are properly scientific. The 
others are still debated as to their real characters. Theories of 
society and of the character and origin of social progress, the- 
ories on the origins and the changes of organic forms, and the- 
ories on the origins and the causes of cosmical bodies and their 
arrangements, are all liable to the taint of teleological'and cos- 
mological conceptions, — to spring from the order which the 
mind imposes upon what it imperfectly observes, rather than 
from that which the objects, were they better known, would 
supply to the mind. 

To us Mr. Spencer's speculation seems but the abstract state- 
ment of the cosmological conceptions, and that kind of order- 
liness which the human mind spontaneously supplies in the 
absence of facts sufficiently numerous and precise to justify 
sound scientific conclusions. Progress and development, when 
they mean more than a continuous proceeding, have a mean- 
4 



74 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

ing suspiciously like what the moral and mythic instincts are 
inclined to, — something having a beginning, a middle, and an 
end, — an epic poem, a dramatic representation, a story, a cos- 
mogony. It is not sufficient for the purposes of science that 
the idea of progress be freed from any reference to human 
happiness as an end. Teleology does not consist entirely of 
speculations having happy denouements , save that the perfection 
or the end to which the progress tends is a happiness to the 
intellect that contemplates it in its evolution and beauty of 
orderliness. Plato's astronomical speculations were teleolog- 
ical in this artistic sense. 

It is not sufficient for the purposes of science, that the idea 
of progress be thus purified ; and it would be better if science 
itself were purified of this idea, at least until proof of its extent 
and reality be borne in upon the mind by the irresistible force 
of a truly scientific induction. Aristotle exhibited the charac- 
teristics of scientific genius in no way more distinctly than in 
the rejection of this idea, and of all cosmological speculations. 

But there is a truth implied in this idea, and an important 
one, — the truth, namely, that the proper objects of scientific re- 
search are all of them processes and the results of processes ; 
not the immutable natures which Plato sought for above- a 
world of confusion and unreality, in the world of his own in- 
telligence, but the immutable elements in the orders of all 
changes, the permanent relations of co-existences and sequences, 
which are hidden in the confusions of complex phenomena. 
Thought itself is a process and the mind a complex series of 
processes, the immutable elements of which must be dis- 
covered, not merely by introspection or by self-consciousness, 
but by the aid of physiological researches and by indirect 
observation. Everything out of the mind is a product, the 
result of some process. Nothing is exempt from change. 
Worlds are formed and dissipated. Races of organic beings 
grow up like their constituent individual members, and dis- 
appear like these. Nothing shows a trace of an original, im- 
mutable nature, except the unchangeable laws of change. 
These point to no beginning and to no end in time, nor to any 
bounds in space. All indications to the contrary in the results 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 75 

of physical research are clearly traceable to imperfections in 
our present knowledge of all • the laws of change, and to that 
disposition to cosmological speculations which still prevails 
even in science. 

We propound these doctrines not as established ones, but as 
having a warrant from the general results of physical research 
similar to that which the postulate of science, the law of causa- 
tion, has in the vaguely discerned order in nature, which 
forces itself on the attention even of the unobservant. But as 
a mind unfamiliar with science is easily persuaded that there 
are phenomena in nature to which the law of causation does 
not apply, phenomena intrinsically arbitrary and capricious, 
so even to those most familiar with our present knowledge of 
physical laws, but who have not attended to the implication of 
their general characters and relations, the supposition is not in- 
credible that there is a tendency in the forces of nature to a 
permanent or persistently progressive change in the theatre of 
their operations, and to an ultimate cessation of all the partic- 
ular conditions on which their manifestations depend. To show 
why this is incredible to us would carry us beyond the proper 
limits of our subject, were it not that our author has speculated 
in the same direction. 

Having developed what he thinks to be the true scientific 
idea of progress in his " Law of Evolution," Mr. Spencer next 
considers its relations to ultimate scientific ideas, the ideas of 
space, time, matter, and force. As evolution is change, and as 
change, scientifically comprehended, is comprehended in terms 
of matter, motion, and force, and the conditions necessary to 
these, or time and space, it is necessary that evolution be fur- 
ther defined in its relations to these ideas. These are only for- 
mulating terms, entirely abstract. They imply no ontological 
theory about the nature of existence of mind or matter; and 
when Mr. Spencer proposes to formulate the. phenomena of 
mind as well as those of matter in terms of matter, motion, 
and force, it is because these ideas are the only precise ones in 
which the phenomena of change can be defined. 

Mr. Spencer is not a materialist. Materialism and spiritual- 
ism, or psychological idealism, are as dogmatic theories equally 



7 6 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSION'S. 



self-contradictory and absurd. Mr. Spencer is neither a mate- 
rialist nor an idealist; neither theist, atheist, nor pantheist. 
All these doctrines are, he thinks, without sense or reason; and 
the philosophers who invented them, and the disciples who re- 
ceived and thought they understood them, were deceived. But 
we are inclined to the opinion that believers, though they may 
be deceived about their ability to comprehend these theories 
(for it is easy to mistake meanings), are not deceived about the 
motives or the spirit which prompts these speculations, and 
which in fact determines for each his election of what doctrine 
best suits his character. For within the pale of philosophy, 
character determines belief, and ideas stand for feelings. We 
receive the truths of science on compulsion. Nothing but ig- 
norance is able to resist them. In philosophy we are free from 
every bias, except that of our own characters ; and it therefore 
seems to us becoming in a philosopher, who is solicitous about 
the moral reputation of his doctrines, and who would avoid 
classification under disreputable categories, that he teach noth- 
ing which he does not know, lest the direction of his inquiries 
be mistaken for that of his dispositions. The vulgar who use 
the obnoxious terms, materialism, atheism, pantheism, do not 
pretend to define them; but they somehow have a very definite 
idea, or at least a strong feeling, about the dangerous character 
of such speculations, which appear none the less reprehensible 
because inconceivable. 

But we must defer the considerations of the moral character 
of Mr. Spencer's speculations, until we have further examined 
their scientific grounds. 

Terms which the real physicist knows how to use as the 
terms of mathematical formulas, and which were never even 
suspected of any heterodox tendencies, terms which have been 
of inestimable service both in formulating and finding out the 
secrets of nature, are appropriated by Mr. Spencer to the fur- 
ther elaboration of his vague definitions, and to the abstract 
description of as much in real nature as they may happen to 
apply to. As if an inventory of the tools of any craft were a 
proper account of its handiwork ! Out of mathematical for- 
mulas these terms lose their definiteness and their utility. 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 



77 



They .become corrupting and misleading ideas. They are 
none the less abstract, but they are less clear. They again 
clothe themselves in circumstance, though vaguely. They ap- 
peal to that indefinite consciousness which, as Mr. Spencer says, 
cannot be formulated, but in which he thinks we have an ap- 
prehension of cause and causal agencies. 

"Though along with the extension of generalizations, and concomitant 
integrations of conceived causal agencies," says Mr. Spencer, "the con- 
ceptions of causal agencies grow more indefinite ; and though as they 
gradually coalesce into a universal causal agency they cease to be repre- 
sentable in thought, and are no longer supposed to be comprehensible, 
yet the consciousness of cause remains as dominant to the last as it was 
at first, and can never be got rid of. The consciousness of cause can be 
abolished only by abolishing consciousness itself." 

This is quoted by himself from his " First Principles," as one 
of his "reasons for dissenting from the philosophy of M. 
Comte." Though he seems solicitous to avoid all ontological 
implications in his use of scientific terms, yet we cannot avoid 
the impression of a vague metaphysical signification in his 
speculations, as if he were presenting all the parts of a system 
of materialism except the affirmative and negative copulas. 
These are withheld, because we cannot be supposed to believe 
anything inconceivable, as all ontological dogmas are. He 
seems to lead us on to the point of requiring our assent to a 
materialistic doctrine, and then lets us off on account of the 
infirmities of our minds; presenting materialism to our con- 
templation rather than to our understandings. 

Mr. Spencer regards the ultimate ideas of science as un- 
knowable ; and in a sense the meanings of the abstractest terms 
are unknowable, that is, are not referable to any notions more 
abstract, nor susceptible of sensuous apprehension or represen- 
tation as such. But the way to know them is to use them in 
mathematical formulas to express precisely what we do know. 
It is true that this cannot yet be done, except in the physical 
sciences proper, and not always with distinctness in these. It 
is only in astronomy and mechanical physics that these terms 
are used with mathematical precision. They change their 
meanings, or at least lose their definiteness, when we come to 
chemistry and physiology. 



7 8 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



" The indestructibility of matter," " the continuity of mo- 
tion," "the conservation of force," and "the correlation and 
equivalence of forces," are ideas which mathematical and phys- 
ical science has rendered familiar. Besides these, Mr. Spencer 
has analyzed others, descriptive of the general external char- 
acteristics of motion; and he continues with a development 
of what the Law of Evolution implies. To all the ideas which 
he adopts from science he adds a new sense, or rather a vague- 
ness, so as to make them descriptive of as much as possible. 
One of these ideas loses in the process so many of its original 
features, as well as its name, that we should not have recog- 
nized it as the same, but for Mr. Spencer's justification of what 
he regards as a change of nomenclature. He prefers "per- 
sistence of force" to "conservation of force," because the lat- 
ter " implies a conservator and an act of conserving," and be- 
cause " it does not imply the existence of the force before that 
particular manifestation of it with which we commence." Sci- 
ence, we are inclined to believe, will not adopt this emenda- 
tion, because the conservation it refers to is that whereby the 
special conditions of the production of any mechanical effect 
in nature are themselves replaced by the changes through 
which this effect is manifested; so that if this effect ceases to 
appear as a motion, it nevertheless exists in the altered antece- 
dents of motions, which may subsequently be developed in the 
course of natural changes. It is this conservation of the con- 
ditions of motion by the operations of nature through the strict- 
est observation of certain mathematical laws, that science wishes 
to express. The objection (if there be any) to this phrase is in 
the word "force." This word is used in mathematical me- 
chanics in three different senses, but fortunately they are 
distinct. They are not here fused together, as they are by Mr. 
Spencer, into one vague expression of what nobody in fact 
knows anything about. There is no danger of ambiguities aris- 
ing from this source in mathematics. The ideas expressed by 
this word are perfectly distinct and definable. The liability to 
ambiguity is only when we pass from mathematical formulas to 
sciences, in which the word has more or less of vagueness and 
an ontological reference. This liability is somewhat dimin- 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 



79 



ished, at least so far as distinct mathematical comprehension is 
concerned, by the use of the phrases, "conservation of mechan- 
ical effect" or "the law of power," which are now employed 
to express the mathematical theorem which has as one of its 
corollaries the doctrine that "perpetual motion" is impossible 
in the sense in which practical mechanics use the words. This 
theorem is deduced from the fundamental laws of motion, or 
those transcendental ideas and definitions which have received 
their proof or justification in their ability to clear up the confu- 
sions with which the movements of nature fall upon the senses 
and present themselves to the undisciplined understanding. 

The phrase "conservation of force" was adopted from 
mathematical mechanics into chemical physics, with reference 
to the question of the possibility of "perpetual motion" by 
means of those natural forces with which chemistry deals. The 
impossibility of "perpetual motion," or the fact that "in the 
series of natural processes there is no circuit to be found by 
which mechanical force can be gained without a corresponding 
consumption," had been demonstrated only with reference to 
the so-called "fixed forces" of nature, or those which depend 
solely on the relative distances of bodies from each other. 
Chemical forces are not mathematically comprehended, and 
are therefore utterly unknown, save in their effects, and their 
laws are unknown, save in the observed invariable orders of 
these effects. These forces are merely hypotheses, and hypoth- 
eses which include little or nothing that is definite or profitable 
to research. But mechanical forces suggested to physicists a 
problem perfectly clear and definite. "Are the laws of chem- 
ical forces also inconsistent with 'perpetual motion'?" "Are 
light, heat, electricity, magnetism, and the force of chemical 
transformations, correlated with each other, and with mechan- 
ical motions and forces, as these are among themselves?" 
Here is something tangible; and the direction which these 
questions have given to physical researches in recent times 
mark out a distinct epoch in scientific progress. Here the an- 
swer could not be found a priori, as a consequent of any 
known or presumed universal laws of nature. Experiment 
must establish these presumptions ; and it does so with such 



80 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

an overwhelming amount of evidence, that they are made the 
grounds of prediction, as the law of gravity was in the dis- 
covery of the planet Uranus. Physicists have anticipated, on 
the ground of the impossibility of perpetual motion, such an 
apparently remote fact as this, " that the freezing temperature 
in water depends on the pressure to which the water is sub- 
jected." Experiment confirms this anticipation. 

The processes of such researches are long and intricate, but 
they are perfectly precise and definite ; and it is thus that the 
law of the "Conservation of Force" is made of value, and not 
by such use as Mr. Spencer is able to make of it, if indeed 
his "Persistence of Force" can be regarded as having any 
meaning in common with it. His principle seems to us to 
bear a much closer resemblance to the old metaphysical 
" Principle of Causality," or the impossibility of any change in 
the quantity of existence (whatever this may mean) ; and it 
also seems to us to be as profitless. 

Having developed his Law of Evolution to maturity, he ar- 
rives at "Equilibration." All evolutions must have an end, 
and this end is "Equilibration." Then there is no longer any 
tendency to " a definite, coherent heterogeneity, through con- 
tinuous dirTerentiavtions and integrations." Life is balanced. 
The worlds are completed. 

Throughout this speculation the mechanical arguments of 
the Nebular Hypothesis have been the guides to Mr. Spencer's 
abstractions, while the doctrines of embryology have furnished 
the terminology. Recent developments of this hypothesis in 
connection with the theory of the correlations of mechanical 
forces and heat, have afforded him a splendid opportunity to 
carry out and illustrate his theories, and this opportunity Mr. 
Spencer has not neglected. Fully convinced of the truth of 
the Nebular Hypothesis, as well as of the importance of his 
own Law of Evolution, he reasons with the earnestness of 
conviction and with the blindness of zeal ; and he brings to 
bear upon his theories the intense interest which the recent 
developments of physics are calculated to awaken concerning 
certain problems in astronomy. The source of the sun's heat, 
the origins of the planets and their motions in the solar system, 






THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 81 

the past and future histories of the earth and of the universe, — 
all these topics have an interest outside of science. They ap- 
peal to the story-loving, mythic instinct which willingly helps 
Science over her difficulties and uncertainties. It is desirable 
on this account to distinguish as far as possible between what 
is demonstrative or scientifically probable, and what is im- 
aginary or poetically probable, in theories on these sub- 
jects. To do this adequately is the work of time, patience, 
and science, following the methods of experimental philosophy 
rather than those of Mr. Spencer. We can now present only 
the elements of these problems, with the impressions which 
come from an a priori distrust of cosmological speculations. 

The discovery of the constant relation of mechanical effect 
and heat, and the determination of the measures by which this 
relation can be mathematically expressed in an equation, gave 
at once, by a simple computation with well-known astronomical 
data, results of the most surprising and interesting character. 
The mere motions of bodies, such as they have in the spaces 
of the solar system, and such as the sun is able to produce 
in bodies falling to it and in the masses of which it is com- 
posed through their mutual attractions, were found to repre- 
sent vastly greater quantities of heat than could be produced 
by any known chemical agency, like combustion, with the same 
quantity of matter of whatever kind. Here then was the long 
sought for origin of the sun's heat. If the motions continually 
produced and arrested in the contractions of the sun's mass, 
incident to its cooling, should only amount to what would 
diminish the sun's diameter by one part in twenty millions in a 
year, it would be sufficient to produce all the enormous amount 
of heat which the sun has been proved to radiate in that time. 
If a body falling from a height not greater than the known 
limits of the solar system should have the motion it would thus 
acquire arrested and dissipated in the form of heat in the mass 
of the sun, it would also produce this amount of heat, pro- 
vided the mass of the body be to that of the sun only as one 
to thirty millions. At least one-half of the energy represented 
by this heat would be acquired in that part of the fall between 
the surface of the sun and a height not greater than the dis- 



82 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSION'S. 

tance of this surface from the centre; and if the body should 
have fallen from the greatest supposable height, all but about 
one in six thousand parts of this energy would have been ac- 
quired within the known limits of the solar system, and all 
but about one in two hundred parts within the limits of the 
earth's orbit. To explain the origin of the sun's heat, two 
theories have, therefore, been advanced. One in accordance 
with the Nebular Hypothesis explains it as arising from the 
falling in upon itself of the matter which composes the mass 
of the sun and an arrest of this motion resulting in heat and a 
continuous contraction of the sun's diameter, but without any 
change in the sun's mass. The*other, on the evidence there 
is of the existence of innumerable small bodies moving in 
irregular and eccentric orbits through the spaces of the solar 
system, supposes the frequent fall of such bodies to the sun, and 
the arrest of their motions in its mass, as the origin of its heat. 

What shall decide between these two theories ? At first 
sight, the fact that the mass of the sun does not change so fast 
as the second theory appears to require, as is evinced by the 
fact that there is not a corresponding change in the attractive 
energy of the sun, and in the resultant periods of revolution 
in the earth and other planets, seems to refute this theory, and 
to decide in favor of the first. On the other hand, the second 
theory appeals to its foundation in independently probable 
evidence which the first does not possess, and to another 
theoretical consideration which explains away this difficulty, 
namely, the consideration that only one-half of the problem 
has yet been attended to ; for on either hypothesis we should 
explain, not only how the sun's heat is produced, but also 
what becomes of the mechanical energy which this heat repre- 
sents. 

Dr. Mayer, who advances the second or the meteoric hy- 
pothesis, is content to affirm that the matter of the sun is 
dissipated also, as well as its heat, through the agency of its 
heat; so that its mass remains sensibly constant. This addi- 
tional hypothesis has in itself about the same character which 
the Nebular Hypothesis possesses. So far, therefore, the two 
explanations are balanced. Both explain the origin of the 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 8$ 

sun's heat and the constancy of its mass by the union of facts 
independently probable with an hypothesis made for the pur- 
pose of explanation but not inconsistent with observed facts. 
The one theory adopts the hypothetical contraction of the 
sun's diameter, which observation has been unable to test, 
with the observed fact that the sun's mass does not increase so 
much as the other theory seems to require. And the other 
theory avoids this requirement by the hypothesis of the dis- 
sipation of the matter of the sun, united with the independ- 
ently probable fact that bodies are continually falling to the 
sun's surface, just as they are continually falling to that of the 
earth, only in vastly greater numbers. 

It is enough to say of the Nebular Hypothesis, that no physi- 
cist of repute regards it as having that degree of independent 
probability which warrants its use as a ground of probable pre- 
diction, or as affording a justification of any new or implied hy- 
pothesis. But the uncertainty as to which of the two mechan- 
ical theories of the origin of the sun's heat is true, should not 
for a moment be compared to the uncertainty of the Nebular 
Hypothesis. For it is almost certain that either one or the other 
is the true explanation; and, indeed, they are not essentially 
inconsistent with each other. Both may be true ; or rather a 
third theory, combining both, may have a probability superior 
to that of either. If it be true that the sun is a body at a mini- 
mum of temperature, which on account of its enormous mass 
and attractive energy is able, through the contractions due to 
its loss of heat, to make compensation for its radiations at the 
expense of its dimensions, then it follows that this temperature 
is also a maximum one, and that an increase of the total heat 
of the sun by the fall of bodies to it will not increase its temper- 
ature, but rather its dimensions; its temperature being kept 
uniform, much as the energies and impulsions of an engine are 
reduced to uniformity by the inertia of its fly-wheel and that of 
the bodies on the resistances of which its energies are expended. 

But on what are the energies of the sun expended ? What 
becomes of its radiations ? Mr. Spencer speaks in his vague 
way and in his dialect of the mechanical processes of the solar 
system as constituting " Evolution where there is a predomi- 



84 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

nant integration of Matter and disintegration of Motion." He 
regards the laws of change as causes of "Dissolution where 
there is a predominant integration of Motion and disintegra- 
tion of Matter." What in the language of physics does all this 
mean ? We suppose it means that the parts of a body or a 
system of bodies are brought nearer each other on the whole 
by a loss of internal motions, whether these be in the form of 
heat or of massive motions ; and that a system or a body is ex- 
panded on the whole by an addition to its internal motions or 
the relative motions of its parts. These are important mechan- 
ical theorems, but their deduction and extension by generaliza- 
tion necessitates the scholium, that all such "Evolutions" are 
attended by corresponding " Dissolutions." Motion is the mo- 
tion of something, though Mr. Spencer seems to speak of it as 
capable of existing by itself. Motion may grow less or cease 
in a body or a system without being lost from it, but in this 
case it is represented by an expansion of the body or the sys- 
tem. The motions of the solar system are continually varying, 
becoming greater or less according as the bodies of the system 
are approaching or receding from each other on the whole. 
But motions really lost from one body or system of bodies are 
taken up by others, and those which are really gained are ac- 
quired from others. This is so universally true, that it includes 
the motions of living as well as of so-called dead matter. The 
motions of heat and of mechanical energy in the living body 
are necessarily derived from the motions and antecedent special 
conditions of motion which are contained in the sunbeam and 
in the food through which the living bodies of plants and an- 
imals are formed. But while in these bodies, during their 
growths and throughout their lifetimes, there is a well-marked 
order and harmony in such changes, the definitions of which 
are the proper definitions of life, yet such an order is not nec- 
essarily implied in the universal laws of change. All that is 
necessarily implied in these is balance and ultimate compensa- 
tions, — compensations in times and spaces, which are wholly 
indefinite, and in concrete series of phenomena, which may or 
may not be simple orders or intelligible as wholes, but over 
which it is certain an elementary order reigns supreme. 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 85 

The principle of the conservation of mechanical energy in 
and through the operations by which it is manifested, is the 
expression of this elementary order, from which, however, 
nothing can be deduced a pi'iori in regard to any class or con- 
crete series of phenomena in nature. The positions of the 
planets are deducible a posteriori from a sufficient number of 
particular facts in this concrete series, and by means of elemen- 
tary laws. But while such successions as life exhibits involve 
the law of the conservation of force, so far as they involve any 
changes in matter, yet no characteristic features in such suc- 
cessions are deducible from this law, notwithstanding Mr. 
Spencer's asserted demonstrations of the contrary. Life must 
still be studied from without. Its principle is not yet discov- 
ered. 

Concentration of matter with a transfer of its internal mo- 
tions to other matter, and separation of matter by motions 
received from without, are both exemplified in growth. Mr. 
Spencer calls the first " Evolution," but the growth of plants 
is really characterized by the second; for though there is a 
concentration of carbon in the tissues of the plant, yet the me- 
chanical operation by which this is effected is really a sepa- 
ration of the carbon from oxygen by the mechanical energy 
of the sunbeam, which, coming in from without, overcomes the 
forces of chemical aggregation in carbonic acid. There is here 
an aggregation of matter so far as mass or weight is concerned, 
but none so far as the chemical forces are concerned. In 
respect to these forces, vegetation is a dispersion of matter 
through an accession of forces ; and combustion or consump- 
tion as food in animal bodies is a dispersion of forces with a 
concentration of matter, though so far as mass or weight is 
concerned this matter is also dispersed in the form of carbonic 
acid gas. 

Dispersion and concentration are not to be mechanically 
measured by mere distances in space, even in the case of grav- 
itation; for, as we have said, a body falling from the limits of 
the solar system acquires on reaching the surface of the sun all 
but one in six thousand parts of the energy which it could 
acquire in falling from the height of the remotest star. The 



S6 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

immense distances by which the stars are separated from each 
other are not, therefore, the representant of a much greater 
energy than that which the dimensions of the solar system rep- 
resent, though these become as nothing in respect to mere dis- 
tance. Gravitation is a feeble force except in close proximity, 
and there is some degree of probability in the speculation 
which regards it as really a resultant of the forces to which it 
seems to give rise. Whether this speculation be true or not, 
there is no evidence that the law of gravity is exact, or more 
than approximately true, or that the force of gravity subsists 
at all between the remotest stars. That it plays but an insig- 
nificant part in determining the distributions and motions of 
stars and systems of stars is highly probable, since these are 
but imperfectly accounted for, if at all, by its law. The mo- 
tions of the closely proximate members of binary stars are in 
fact the only ones in sidereal astronomy which have been 
brought under the law of gravity. Still it would be contrary 
to the postulate of science, or to any sound principle of philoso- 
phizing, to regard the distribution of the stars as in any abso- 
lute sense fortuitous ; for in this also, as in nature generally, 
there is that vaguely discerned order which warrants the postu- 
late of science, and its efforts to decipher what it has a right to 
presume, namely, at least an elementary order. 

We hold the opinion that the mechanical theory of heat, 
when it comes to be applied in earnest to the problems of 
dynamics in sidereal astronomy, will be rewarded with triumphs 
not inferior to those which the law of gravitation has achieved 
in the solar system ; and that the distribution of the stars will 
be accounted for, not on the hypothesis of simple attractive or 
repulsive forces, but by the distributions of matter and heat 
through the interstellar spaces, and by their actions and re- 
actions, not as centres of simple forces, but as the receptacles 
of concrete masses and motions, and as the sources of diffused 
motions and matters, none of which can ever be lost or de- 
stroyed; that their motions will be found to result principally 
from those of the medium of diffused materials, from which 
they are aggregated precipitates, and into which they are evap- 
orated by heat. 






THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 87 

This is at present only an hypothesis, but it is not teleolog- 
ical in any sense of the term. The most obvious objection to 
it is the theory that there is u a "universal tendency in nature 
to the dissipation of mechanical energy," a theory well founded, 
nay, demonstrated,* if we only follow this energy as far as the 
present limits of science extend. But to a true Aristotelian 
this theory, so far from suggesting a dramatic denouement, such 
as the ultimate death of nature, only propounds new problems. 
What becomes of the sun's dynamic energy, and whence do 
the bodies come which support this wasting power ? 

The earth is composed of masses mechanically as well as 
chemically heterogeneous. The forces of chemical aggrega- 
tion overcome this confusion to a limited extent, through the 
agency of internal heat and aqueous solution, in the formation 
of metallic deposits and crystalline segregations, but only to a 
limited extent. Long persistent mechanical actions of air and 
water, and vegetable aggregations, produce a similar mechanical 
homogeneity in geological deposits. Still the materials of the 
earth's surface exist as if they had been thrown together with- 
out any determinable order, — as if the earth and similar bodies 
had been compounded of the materials of smaller masses fall- 
ing together, and gradually wrought by geological forces into 
the little order they present. Materials continue to arrive at 
the earth's surface, — in how great quantities it is at present 
impossible to form a trustworthy estimate. Are not all large 
bodies so formed ? But how are the smaller bodies formed ? 
The comets, which are more numerous "in the heavens than 
fish in the ocean," and the meteors, more numerous than the 
sands of the desert, — how are they formed ? Our answer is 
an hypothesis. They are formed by chemical and mechanical 
aggregation from matters diffused throughout space by the 
mechanical energy of the sun ; and by their fall they restore 
this energy. This would complete the round, of nature, but 
the theory is not thereby demonstrated. Scientific demon- 
stration is slow and painful, the work of time and patience. 
All that can now be presented are problems, but these are sci- 
entific problems. They are concerned with the details of an 

* By Professor William Thomson. 



88 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

elementary order, which science has a right to presume, and 
not with the abstract features of an external order, which 
science has no right to presume. 

Following the publication of his " First Principles," there ap- 
peared a short essay by Mr. Spencer on "The Classification of 
the Sciences;" to which are added his "Reasons for dissenting 
from the Philosophy of M. Comte." We had a little hope that 
here at least Mr. Spencer's reputation for philosophical analysis, 
and for an extensive knowledge of the sciences, would stand 
proof, and be confirmed by a valuable result. Instead of this, 
we find nothing deserving attention from any one who does 
not find in his "First Principles" the germs of a great philos- 
ophy, except bad criticism, a perverted terminology, and 
fanciful discriminations. 

Nearly all philosophers are agreed, we believe, in assigning 
logic and mathematics to a distinct division of the sciences, 
and these have with great propriety been denominated formal 
sciences, as distinguished from the real or material sciences. 
This propriety is quite independent of any metaphysical or 
critical theory which we may have about the origin or intrinsic 
character of mathematical and logical truth. Whether we 
regard the truths of formal science as really universal or not, 
their presumed universality is what determines their peculiar 
character and functions in science generally. But Mr. Spen- 
cer seems more solicitous to avoid an implication of a meta- 
physical doctrine, which these terms have, than to avail himself 
of their real scientific utility ; and he uses, instead of them, 
the ambiguous and otherwise objectionable terms "abstract" 
an>i "concrete," and is obliged, consequently, to define and 
defend these in the sense in which he proposes to use them. 
Truths that have exemplification in nearly every class of facts 
of which we have precise knowledge, the axioms and postulates 
of which are implied, indeed, in all knowledge, may relatively 
to all other truths be properly regarded as a priori and formal 
or as the moulds into which these truths are cast. It may be, 
as Mr. Spencer thinks, that these truths are obtained by ab- 
straction alone, from our experience of things; nevertheless, to 
make any reference in a classification to this circumstance is 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 



89 



to sacrifice the proper objects of a classification to an extrinsic 
object, and is also open to the objection which seems to have 
prevailed with him, though he makes no explicit reference to it, 
against the more generally received terms "formal" and "ma- 
terial." "Formal" implies precisely what Mr. Spencer means 
by wholly abstract, and "material" what he means by wholly 
concrete; but he uses the unqualified terms "abstract" and 
"concrete" in these extreme senses. He gets confused about 
the distinction of "abstract" and "general," and thinks M. 
Comte and M. Littre have confounded them. 

According to the most authentic usage, "abstract" and 
"general," though not the same, are not antithetical, as Mr. 
Spencer would have them to be. He says: " Abstractness 
means, detachment from the incidents of particular cases. Gen- 
erality means manifestation in numerous cases." Total de- 
tachment he means, for he uses "abstract" and "concrete" as 
exclusive contraries. In this use, however, Mr. Spencer is not 
alone; for the character of the process of abstraction, says 
Sir William Hamilton, has "been overlooked by philosophers, 
insomuch that they have opposed the terms concrete and ab- 
stract as exclusive contraries." But no philosopher before 
Mr. Spencer has attempted to establish any opposition between 
"abstract" and "general;" for though the "abstract" does not 
imply generality, yet generality is dependent on abstraction. 
" Manifestation in numerous cases" is the manifestation of 
what ? — we would inquire of Mr. Spencer. Of anything but 
what must be obtained by abstraction ? And yet he claims that 
his use of the words "abstract," "concrete," and "general" is 
the correct one. M. Littre's definition of abstractness as "sub- 
jective generality," does not appear to us a very happy one, 
but it is vastly superior to his critic's definitions. 

In designating by the terms "abstract," "abstract-concrete," 
and "concrete" the divisions of the sciences which the words 
"formal," "mixed," and "material" have hitherto denoted, 
Mr. Spencer has only confused a subject already possessed of 
an adequately precise nomenclature. The presumed univer- 
sality of mathematical and logical truth, the entirely empirical 
generality of merely descriptive sciences, and the union of these 



9 o PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

kinds of truth in general physics, are properly connoted by the 
terms already in use. 

In Mr. Spencer's subdivisions of mathematics he has given 
a prominence to "Descriptive Geometry" which might be 
regarded as arising from the partiality of the civil engineer for 
a branch of his own art, were it not that he says : 

"I was ignorant of the existence of this as a separate division of 
mathematics, until it was described to me by Mr. Hirst, whom I have 
also to thank for pointing out the omission of the subdivision 'Kine- 
matics.' It was only when seeking to affiliate and define 'Descriptive 
Geometry ' that I reached the conclusion that there is a negatively-quan- 
titative mathematics, as well as a positively-quantitative mathematics. In 
explanation of the term negatively-quantitative, it will suffice to instance 
the proposition that certain three lines will meet in a point, as a negative- 
ly-quantitative proposition ; since it asserts the absence of any quantity 
of space between their intersections. Similarly, the assertion that certain 
three points will always fall in a straight line is negatively-quantitative ; 
since the conception of a straight line implies the negation of any lateral 
quantity or deviation." 

The propositions selected by Mr. Spencer to illustrate what 
he calls "Descriptive Geometry" are by no means peculiar to 
or characteristic of the art to which mathematicians have given 
this name. In the most elaborate and extensive treatises no 
more is claimed for this art than that it is an account in a sci- 
entific order of certain methods of geometrical construction, 
useful in engineering and architecture, but inferior in scientific 
extension even to trigonometry, to which Mr. Spencer does 
not deign to descend. It is possible that Mr. Spencer has in 
mind certain propositions in the " Higher Geometry " concern- 
ing relations of position and direction in points and lines ; but 
these cannot be made to stand alone or independently of di- 
mensional properties, and if they could, they would be as ap- 
propriately named "qualitative" mathematics as "negatively- 
quantitative." In short, this is the most flagrant application of 
" the principle of contraries " in classification which has ever 
come to our notice. If Mr. Spencer proposes to select from 
mathematics all positively-quantitative problems and proposi- 
tions for one branch, and all negatively-quantitative ones for 
the other, he must reconstruct, if he can, the whole science, 
and the question of terminology will then be a question be- 
tween him and his brothers in his own craft. 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 



9 1 



Having treated first in order the second part of Mr. Spencer's 
"First Principles," which comprises his "Laws of the Know- 
able," we now turn to the consideration of his doctrine of 
" the Unknowable," and his position before the religious world. 

This position has been greatly misunderstood, and Mr. Spen- 
cer himself has contributed much to the misunderstanding. 
He has appeared as a champion for what is sound in the older 
philosophy, and one of his avowed objects is to reconcile the 
truths of religion with those of science. He is anxious not to 
be thought a positivist, and he publishes as an appendix to his 
"First Principles" a response to his reviewer in the Revue des 
Deux Mondes, to show that he is not a positivist or a follower 
of M. Comte. 

It requires only a little thoughtful attention to the specula- 
tions of Mr. Spencer and M. Comte to see that they are radi- 
cally unlike, not only in the details of doctrine, but in their os- 
tensible aims. The religious world, however, though perhaps 
a little too trusting and a little dull of thought, has very acute 
feelings, and a fine sagacity in apprehending the religious drift 
of a system of philosophy. It began to have suspicions, but it 
was, nevertheless, anxious to see the truths of science recon- 
ciled with those of religion, and so it has continued to listen to 
Mr. Spencer. 

There can be no doubt of the earnestness and moral honesty 
of Mr. Spencer's writings. He is conscious of a generous pur- 
pose, and is actuated by the modern form of religious sentiment, 
— moral idealism, or a belief in the moral perfectibility of things 
in general. He only lacks a distinct consciousness of his exact 
position with reference to older forms of religious sentiment. 
He imagines that his philosophy can conciliate these also. 
This conciliation is effected, he thinks, by presenting the un- 
knowable as a subject of contemplation, — the abstract unknow- 
able, not an entity or a subject for propositions and beliefs. 
Beliefs about the unknowable are absurd, thinks Mr. Spencer. 
It is only in the existence of the unknowable as implied in the 
existence and limits of the knowable that we can believe, and 
this becomes more and more distinct as the knowable becomes 
more distinct in its conditions and limits. 



9 2 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



"Thus the consciousness of an Inscrutable Power manifested to u? 
through all phenomena has been growing ever clearer, and must eventu- 
ally be freed from its imperfections. The certainty that on the one hand 
such a Power exists, while on the other hand its nature transcends intui- 
tion and is beyond imagination, is the certainty towards which intelligence 
has from the first been progressing. To this conclusion science inevitably 
arrives as it reaches its confines ; while to this conclusion religion is ir- 
resistibly driven by criticism. And satisfying as it does the demands of 
the most rigorous logic at the same time that it gives the religious senti- 
ment the widest possible sphere of action, it is the conclusion we are 
bound to accept without reserve or qualification. 

"Some do indeed allege that though the Ultimate Cause of things can- 
not really be thought of by us as having specified attributes, it is yet in- 
cumbent upon us to assert these attributes. Though the forms of our 
consciousness are such that the Absolute cannot in any manner or degree 
be brought 'within them, we are nevertheless told that we must represent 
the Absolute to ourselves under these forms. As writes Mr. Mansel in 
the work from which I have already quoted largely, ' It is our duty then 
to think of God as personal ; and it is our duty to believe that he is infi- 
nite.' 

" That this is not the conclusion here adopted needs hardly be said. 
If there be any meaning in the foregoing arguments, duty requires us 
neither to affirm or deny personality. Our duty is to submit ourselves 
with all humility to the established limits of our intelligence, and not per- 
versely to rebel against them. Let those who can believe that there is 
eternal war set between our intellectual faculties and our moral obligations. 
I for one admit no such radical vice in the constitution of things. 

"This, which to most will seem an essentially irreligious position, is 
an essentially religious one, — nay, is //^religious one to which, as already 
shown, all others are but approximations." 

We are inclined to think, nevertheless, that the older forms 
of religious sentiment, instead of being satisfied with this, and 
accepting it in lack of a better reconciliation, will resort rather 
to formularies and the fine arts. Religious sentiments are es- 
sentially constructive. They must have propositions, or some- 
thing to believe, — something to give entire, free, and hearty 
assent to. Strings of abstract incomprehensible terms, with the 
copulas all left out, — nothing to believe in except our own ig- 
norance (however respectable this may be), — will never do. If 
thought cannot furnish the copulas, feeling can and will. 

But, we must repeat that the philosophy of Sir William 
Hamilton went as far in the direction of empiricism as was 
possible without renouncing the interests to which philosophy 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 



93 



has always been devoted. Hamilton's doctrine aimed only 
at this, — to show that unbelief or negative dogmatism was un- 
founded, and to open the way for the authority of religious 
feeling. 

Mr. Mansel, correctly apprehending the drift of Sir William 
Hamilton's doctrine, elaborated it still further, and supplied 
what was wanting to make it a religious philosophy, namely, 
the authority of religious feeling ; but it was the authority of 
the religious feelings of his own sect, of course. This move- 
ment, apparently in behalf of the Established Church, roused 
great opposition to the doctrines of Hamilton on the part of 
dissenting theologians. They attacked what had been before 
called in question, the empirical doctrines to which, while ad- 
mitting" and defending them theoretically, Hamilton opposed 
what is peculiarly his own philosophy, as a practical defense of 
religion. But any other sectarians were just as competent to 
supply the defects of Hamilton's philosophy as Mr. Mansel. 
They had only to advance the authority of their religious feel- 
ings into the vacant place. Controversy would have gone on 
just as before. Only the irreligious would have been excluded 
from the field. But the vacant place was historically preoc- 
cupied by Mr. Mansel, and it was thought necessary by the 
others to carry the whole position. 

Thus religious controversy blinded both the friends and the 
foes of religious philosophy in regard to the true scope and po- 
sition of Sir William Hamilton's doctrine. He has come to 
be regarded by both parties as the great modern champion of 
philosophical empiricism, whereas he only cited it against 
Cousin and the German rationalists, and proposed as his own 
contribution to philosophy that which is regarded by Mr. 
Spencer as a defect and an inconsistency in his philosophy. 

" The Conditioned," says Hamilton, "is a mean between two extremes, 
two inconditionates, exclusive of each other, neither of which can be con- 
ceived as possible, but of which, on the principles of contradiction and ex- 
cluded middle, one must be admitted as necessary. On this opinion, 
therefore, reason is shown to be weak, but not deceitful. The mind is 
not represented as conceiving two propositions subversive of each other 
as equally possible ; but only as unable to understand as possible either 
of two extremes, one of which, however, on the ground of their mutual 



94 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



repugnance, it is compelled to recognize as true. We are thus taught the 
salutary lesson, that the capacity of thought is not to be constituted into 
the measure of existence ; and are warned from recognizing the domain of 
our knowledge as necessarily co-extensive with the horizon of our faith. 
And by a wonderful revelation we are thus, in the very consciousness of 
our inability to conceive aught above the relative and finite, inspired with 
a belief in the existence of something unconditioned beyond the sphere of 
all comprehensible reality." 

Of this passage, in which Sir William Hamilton first stated 
his own peculiar doctrine, though less clearly than in his subse- 
quent writings, Mr. Spencer says : 

"By the laws of thought, as Sir William Hamilton has interpreted 
them, he finds himself forced to the conclusion, that our consciousness of 
the absolute is a pure negation. He nevertheless finds that there does 
exist in consciousness an irresistible conviction of the real 'existence of 
something unconditioned.' And he gets over the inconsistency by speak- 
ing of this conviction as a 'wonderful revelation,' 'a belief with which 
we are 'inspired'-; thus apparently hinting that it is supernaturally at 
variance with the laws of thought. [!] Mr. Mansel is betrayed into a like 
inconsistency," — 

which Mr. Spencer proceeds to point out. 

Strange inconsistency indeed, if it be true, between that 
which is mistaken by his critic as the essence of his philosophy, 
and that which, being the real essence, is regarded as an incon- 
sistency. Supposing Sir William Hamilton and Mr. Mansel 
are really arguing in the interests of empiricism, he tries to help 
them out, and supply another proof of "the relativity of all 
knowledge;" yet he finds in some of the statements of his 
friends an implication of " a grave error." He thinks they deny 
by implication that we can "rationally affirm the positive exis- 
tence of anything beyond phenomena ; " whereas what they are 
all along trying to prove is, that we can rationally affirm what 
we cannot positively conceive or construe to thought. This 
includes what Mr. Spencer calls "the incomplete thoughts of 
an indefinite consciousness," and more. It even signifies that 
we can and do rationally affirm not only what is incompletely 
thought of, but that of which we can only think the meanings, 
or the relations of the terms by which it is expressed. 

Mr. Spencer believes that we have an indefinite conscious- 
ness of the Absolute and of Cause, but not one which will war- 



THE PHILOSOPHY OF HERBERT SPENCER. 



95 



rant any other proposition than that which is implied in this 
consciousness, namely, that it is not distinct. That we can be 
distinctly ignorant is the highest religious truth he has to offer. 
In setting forth this his contribution *to religious philosophy, he 
characterizes the argument of his predecessors thus : 

"Truly to realize in thought any one of the propositions of which 
the argument consists, the unconditioned must be represented as posi- 
tive, not negative. How then can it be a legitimate conclusion from the 
argument, that our consciousness of it is negative? An argument, the 
very construction of which assigns to a certain term a certain meaning, 
but which ends in showing that this term has no such meaning, is simply 
an elaborate suicide." 

But really the argument of which Mr. Spencer has proved 
his total misapprehension is not an argument about meanings 
at all, but about the supposed objects of thought which the 
terms of the argument denote. To conceive the meaning of 
a proposition and to conceive the proposition itself, or to con- 
ceive the fact which the proposition expresses, are not the 
same; though in confounding them Mr. Spencer does not 
stand alone. The question is about the mind's ability, right, or 
dutv to believe what, as stated in a proposition, is stated in 
terms which, while their meanings are clear, cannot be united 
in a judgment, either by proof from what is truly known, or by 
intuition. If two such propositions stand in mutual contradic- 
tion, says Sir William Hamilton, one of them must be true, or 
the laws of thought are false; and he offers the alternative of 
absolute or philosophical scepticism, a suspension of all judg- 
ments, or a belief in something inconceivable. He offers it of 
course only formally; for a decision in favor of scepticism is 
self-contradictory, a judgment that all judgments are false, 
which ends in that painful uncertainty exhibited in the soph- 
ism of the liar, to which we referred in- treating of Mr. Spen- 
cer's Psychology. The choice between having judgments 
and having none is, of course, only a paradoxical mode of 
presenting the absurdity which cannot really be committed, but 
which is implied in certain confusions of thought. It was to 
remove these confusions by clear philosophical statements, 
and not to prove anything, that Hamilton's doctrine of the 
conditioned was propounded. 



9 6 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



We have now completed our survey of the principal philo- 
sophical works of Mr. Spencer, a writer whose pretensions aim 
at a system of truth which shall formulate all legitimate human 
knowledge, but whose performance of the part he has under- 
taken gives little hope of success in what yet remains to do. 
The number of topics which we have been led to consider 
in this survey illustrates the versatility of our author, and the 
number in regard to which we have been compelled to deny 
his conclusions illustrates his incompetency for the further de- 
velopment of his encyclopedic abstractions. 



LIMITS OF NATURAL SELECTION.* 

Few scientific theories have met with such a cordial recep- 
tion by the world of scientific investigators, or created in so 
short a time so complete a revolution in general philosophy, as 
the doctrine of the derivation of organic species by Natural 
Selection; perhaps in this respect no other can compare with it 
when we consider the incompleteness of the proofs on which it 
still relies, or the previous prejudice against the main thesis im- 
plied in it, the theory of the development or transmutation of 
species. The Newtonian theory of gravity, or Harvey's theory 
of the circulation of the blood, in spite of the complete and 
overwhelming proofs by which these were soon substantiated, 
were much longer in overcoming to the same degree the 
deeply-rooted prejudices and preconceptions opposed to them. 
In less than a decade the doctrine of Natural Selection had 
conquered the opposition of the great majority of the students 
of natural history, as well as of the students of general philoso- 
phy; and it seems likely that we shall witness the unparalleled 
spectacle of an all but universal reception by the scientific 
world of a revolutionary doctrine in the lifetime of its author ; 
though by the rigorous tests of scientific induction it will yet 
hardly be entitled to more than the rank of a very probable 
hypothesis. How is this singular phenomenon to be ex- 
plained ? Doubtless in great part by the extraordinary skill 
which Mr. Darwin has brought to the proof and promulgation 

* From the North American Review, October, 1870. 



9 8 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



of his views. To this, Mr. Wallace thus testifies in the Preface 
to his book : * 

"The present work will, I venture to think, prove that I both saw at the 
time the value and scope of the law which I had discovered, and have 
since been able to apply it to some purpose in a few original lines of in- 
vestigation. But here my claims cease. I have felt all my life, and I 
still feel, the most sincere satisfaction that Mr. Darwin had been at work 
long before me, and that it was not left for me to attempt to write 'The 
Origin of Species.' I have long since measured my own strength, and 
know well that it would be quite unequal to that task. Far abler men 
than myself may confess that they have not that untiring patience in ac- 
cumulating, and that wonderful skill in using large masses of facts of the 
most varied kinds, — that wide and accurate physiological knowledge, — 
that acuteness in devising, and skill in carrying out, experiments, and 
that admirable style of composition, at once clear, . persuasive, and judi- 
cial, — qualities which, in their harmonious combination, mark out Mr. 
Darwin as the man, perhaps of all men now living, best fitted for the great 
work he has undertaken and accomplished." 

But the skillful combination of inductive and deductive 
proofs with hypothesis, though a powerful engine of scientific 
discovery, must yet work upon the basis of a preceding and 
simpler induction. Pythagoras would never have demonstrated 
the "forty-seventh," if he had not had some ground of believing 
in it beforehand. The force and value of the preceding and 
simpler induction have been obscured in this case by sub- 
sequent investigations. And yet that more fundamental evi- 
dence accounts for the fact that two such skillful observers 
and reasoners as Mr. Wallace and Mr. Darwin arrived at the 
same convictions in regard to the derivation of species, in 
entire independence of each other, and were constrained to 
accept the much-abused and almost discarded "transmutation 
hypothesis." And both moreover reached, independently, the 
same explanation of the process of derivation. This was ob- 
viously from their similar experiences as naturalists ; from the 
force of the same obscure and puzzling facts which their stud- 
ies of the geographical distributions of animals and plants had 
brought to their notice, though the Malthusian doctrine of 

* Contributions to the Theory of Natural Selection. A Series of Essays. By Alfred 
Rupell Wallace, London, 1870. 



LIMITS OF NATURAL SELECTION. 99 

population was, doubtless, the original source of their common 
theory. Mr. Darwin, in the Introduction to his later work on 
" The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication," 
attributes the beginnings of his speculations to the phenomena 
of the distributions of life over large continental areas, and in 
the islands of large archipelagoes, and especially refers to the 
curious phenomena of life in the Galapagos Islands in the Pa- 
cific Ocean. Mr. Wallace, in his first essay, originally pub- 
lished in 1855, four years earlier than "The Origin of Species," 
refers to the same class of facts, and the same special facts in 
regard to the Galapagos Islands, as facts which demand the 
transmutation hypothesis for their sufficient explanation. 

While then much is to be credited to the sagacity and 
candor of these most accomplished travelers and observers in 
appreciating the force of obscure and previously little studied 
facts, yet their theoretical discussions of the hypothesis brought 
forward to explain them have been of still more importance 
in arousing an ever-increasing activity in the same field, and 
in creating a new and most stimulating interest in the ex- 
ternal economy of life, — in the relations of living beings to 
the special conditions of their existence. And so the dis- 
cussion is no longer closet work. It is no web woven from 
self-consuming brains, but a vast accumulation of related facts 
of observation, bound together by the bond of what must still 
be regarded as an hypothesis, — an hypothesis, however, which 
has no rival with any student of nature in whose mind rever- 
ence does not, in some measure, neutralize the aversion of the 
intellect to what is arbitrary. 

In anticipating the general acceptance of the doctrine 
which Mr. Darwin and Mr. Wallace, have done so much 
to illustrate, we ought to except those philosophers who, 
from a severe, ascetic, and self-restraining temper, or from 
preoccupation with other researches, are disposed to regard 
such speculations as beyond the proper province of scientific 
inquiry. But to stop short in a research of " secondary causes," 
so long as experience or reason can suggest any derivation of 
laws and relations in nature which must otherwise be accepted 



IO o PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSION'S. 

as ultimate facts, is not agreeable to that Aristotelian type of 
mind which scientific culture so powerfully tends to produce. 
Whatever the theological tendencies of such a mind, whether 
ultimate facts are regarded by it as literally arbitrary, the de- 
crees of an absolute will, or are summarily explained by what 
Professor De Morgan calls " that exquisite atheism, 'the nature 
of things,'" it still cannot look upon the intricate system of 
adaptations, peculiar to the organic world (which illustrates 
what Cuvier calls " the principle of the conditions of existence, 
vulgarly called the principle oi final causes"), — it cannot look 
upon this as an arbitrary system, or as composed of facts in-. 
dependent of all ulterior facts (like the axioms of mechanics or 
arithmetic or geometry), so long as any explanation, not tan- 
tamount to arbitrariness itself, has any probability in the order of 
nature. This scientific instinct stops far short of an irreverent 
attitude of mind, though it does not permit things that claim 
its reverence to impede its progress. And so a class of facts, 
of which the organical sciences had previously made some use 
as instruments of scientific discovery, but which was appropri- 
ated especially to the reasonings of Natural. Theology, has 
fallen to the province of the discussions of Natural Selection, 
and has been wonderfully enlarged in consequence. It cannot 
be denied that this change has weakened the force of the ar- 
guments of Natural Theology ; but it is simply by way of sub- 
traction or by default, and not as offering any arguments op- 
posed to the main conclusions of theology. " Natural Selec- 
tion is not inconsistent with Natural Theology," in the sense 
of refuting the main conclusions of that science ; it only 
reduces to the condition of an arbitrary assumption one im- 
portant point in the interpretation of special adaptations in or- 
ganic life, namely, the assumption that in such adaptations 
foresight and special provision is shown, analogous to the de- 
signing, anticipatory imaginings and volitions in the mental 
actions of the higher animals, and especially in the mind of 
man. 

Upon this point the doctrine of Natural Selection assumes 
only such general anticipation of the wants or advantages of 



LIMITS OF NATURAL SELECTION. IO i 

an animal or plant as is implied in the laws of inheritance. 
That is, an animal or plant is produced adapted to the general 
conditions of its existence, with only such anticipations of a 
change or of varieties in these conditions as is implied in its 
general tendency to vary from the inherited type. Pardcular 
uses have no special causal relations to the variations that oc- 
cur and become of use. In other word's, Natural Selection, as 
an hypothesis, does not assume, and, so far as it is based on ob- 
servation, it affords no evidence, that any adaptation is specially 
anticipated in the order of nature. From this point of view, 
the wonderfully intricate system of special adaptations in the 
organic world is, at any epoch of its history, altogether retro- 
spective. Only so far as the past affords a type of the future, 
both in the organism itself and in its externa] conditions, can 
the conditions of existence be said to determine the adaptations 
of life. As thus interpreted, the doctrine of Final Causes is de- 
prived of the feature most obnoxious to its opponents, that 
abuse of the doctrine "which makes the cause to be engendered 
by the effect." But it is still competent to the devout mind to 
take a broader view of the organic world, to regard, not its sin- 
gle phases only, but the whole system from its first beginnings 
as presupposing all that it exhibits, or has exhibited, or could 
exhibit, of the contrivances and adaptations which may thus in 
one sense be said to be foreordained. In this view, however, 
the organical sciences lose their traditional and peculiar value 
to the arguments of Natural Theology, and become only a part 
of the universal order of nature, like the physical sciences gen- 
erally, in the principles of which philosophers have professed to 
find no sign of a divinity. But may they not, while professing 
to exclude the idea of God from their systems, have really in- 
cluded him unwittingly, as immanent in the very thought that 
denies, in the very systems that ignore him ? 

So far as Natural Theology aims to prove that the principles 
of utility and adaptation are all-pervasive laws in the organic 
world, Natural Selection is not only not inconsistent, but is iden- 
tical with it. But here Natural Selection pauses. It does not 
go on to what has been really the peculiar province of Natural 



102 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

Theology, to discover, or trace the analogies of organic adapta- 
tions to proper designs, or to the anticipations of wants and ad- 
vantages in the mental actions of man and the higher animals. 
In themselves these mental actions bear a striking resemblance 
to those aspects of organic life in general, which Natural Selec- 
tion regards; and according to the views of the experiential psy- 
chologist, this resemblance is not a mere analogy. In them- 
selves, and without reference to the external uses of these 
mental actions, they are the same generalized reproductions of. 
a past experience as those which the organic world exhibits in 
its laws of inheritance, and are modified by the same tenta- 
tive powers and processes of variation, but to a much greater 
degree. But here the resemblance ceases. The relations of 
such mental actions to the external life of an organism, in 
which they are truly prophetic and providential agencies, 
though founded themselves on the observation of a past order 
in experience, are entirely unique and unparalleled, so far as 
any assumption in the doctrine of Natural Selection, or any 
uroofs which it adduces are concerned. Nevertheless a greater 
though vaguer analogy remains. Some of the wants and adap- 
tations of men and animals are anticipated by their designing 
mental actions. Does not a like foreseeing power, ordaining 
and governing the whole of nature, anticipate and specially 
provide for some of its adaptations ? This appears to be the 
distinctive position in which Natural Theology now stands. 

We have dwelt somewhat at length on this aspect of our au- 
thor's subject, with reference to its bearing on his philosophical 
views, set forth in his concluding essay on "The Limits of Nat- 
ural Selection as applied to Man," in which his theological 
position appears to be that which we have just defined. We 
should like to quote many passages from the preceding essays, 
in illustration of the principle of utility and adaptation, in which 
Mr. Wallace appears at his best; but one example must suffice. 
"It is generally acknowledged that the best test of the truth 
and completeness of a theory is the power which it gives us of 
prevision " ; and on this ground Mr. Wallace justly claims 
great weight for the following inquiry into the " use of the gaudy 



LIMITS OF NATURAL SELECTION'. 103 

colors of many caterpillars," in the essay on Mimicry, etc., p. 
117: 

" Since this essay was first published, a very curious difficulty has been 
cleared up by the application of the general principle of protective coloring. 
Great numbers of caterpillars are so brilliantly marked and colored as to 
be very conspicuous even at a considerable distance, and it has been no- 
ticed that such caterpillars seldom hide themselves. Other species, how- 
ever, are green or brown, closely resembling the colors of the substances 
on which they feed ; while others again imitate sticks, and stretch them- 
selves out motionless from a twig, so as to look like one of its branches. 
Now, as caterpillars form so large a part of the food of birds, it was not 
easy to understand why any of them should have such bright colors and 
markings as to make them specially visible. Mr. Darwin had put the 
case to me as a difficulty from another point of view, for he had arrived 
at the conclusion that brilliant coloration in the animal kingdom is mainly 
due to sexual selection, and this could not have acted in the case of sexless 
larvae. Applying here the analogy of other insects, I reasoned, that since 
some caterpillars were evidently protected by their imitative coloring, and 
others by their spiny or hairy bodies, the bright colors of the rest must 
also be in some way useful to them. I further thought, that as some but- 
terflies and moths were greedily eaten by birds while others were distaste- 
ful to them, and these latter were mostly of conspicuous colors, so proba- 
bly these brilliantly colored caterpillars were distasteful and therefore never 
eaten by birds. Distastefulness alone would, however, be of little ser- 
vice to caterpillars, because their soft and juicy bodies are so delicate, 
that if seized and afterwards rejected by a bird they would almost certainly 
be killed. Some constant and easily perceived signal was therefore nec- 
essary to serve as a warning to birds never to touch these uneatable kinds, 
and a very gaudy and conspicuous coloring, with the habit of fully expo- 
sing themselves to view, becomes such a signal, being in strong contrast 
with the green and brown tints and retiring habits of the eatable kinds. 
The subject was brought by me before the Entomological Society (see 
Proceedings, March 4, 1867), in order that those members having oppor- 
tunities for making observations might do so in the following summer," 
etc. 

Extensive experiments with birds, insectivorous reptiles, and 
spiders, by two British naturalists, were published two years 
later, and fully confirmed Mr. Wallace's anticipations. His 
book is full of such curious matters. 

In a controversial essay called " Creation by Law," an an- 
swer to various criticisms of the doctrine of Natural Selection, 
Mr. Wallace is equally happy and able; and in his essay on 



104 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

"The Action of Natural Selection on Man," he shows a won- 
derful sagacity and skill in developing a new phase of his sub- 
ject, while meeting, as in so many other cases, obstacles and 
objections to the theory. It appears, both by geological evi- 
dence and by deductive reasonings in this essay, that the 
human race is singularly exempt from variation and the ac- 
tion of Natural Selection, so far as its merely physical quali- 
ties are concerned. This follows from theoretical considera- 
tions, since the race has come to depend mainly on its mental 
qualities, and since it is on these, and not on its bodily powers, 
that Natural Selection must act. Hence the small amount of 
physical differences between the earliest men of whom the re- 
mains have been found and the men of the present day, as com- 
pared to differences in other and contemporary races of mam- 
mals. We may generalize from this and from Mr. Darwin's 
observation on the comparatively extreme variability of plants, 
that in the scale of life there is a gradual decline in physical 
variability, as the organism has gathered into itself resources for 
meeting the exigencies of changing external conditions; and 
that while in the mindless and motionless plant these resources 
are at a mhiimum, their maximum is reached in the mind of 
man, which, at length, rises to a level with the total order and 
powers of nature, and in its scientific comprehension of nature 
is a summary, an epitome of the world. But the scale of life 
determined by the number and variety of actual resources in 
an organism ought to be distinguished from the rank that de- 
pends on a high degree of specialty in particular parts and 
functions, since in such respects an organism tends to be highly 
variable. 

But Mr. Wallace thinks, and argues in his concluding essay, 
that this marvelous being, the human mind, cannot be a prod- 
uct of Natural Selection; that some, at least, of the mental 
and moral qualities of man are beyond the jurisdiction and 
measure of utility; that Natural Selection has its limits, and 
that among the most conspicuous examples of its failure to 
explain the order of nature are the more prominent and char- 
acteristic distinctions of the human race. Some of these, ac- 



LIMITS OF NATURAL SELECTION. 105 

cording to Mr. Wallace, are physical; not only the physical 
instruments of man's mental nature, his voluminous brain, his 
cunning hand, the structure and power of his vocal organs, but 
also a characteristic which appears to have no relation to his 
mental nature, — his nakedness. Man is distinguished from all 
soft and delicate skinned terrestrial mammals in having no 
hairy covering to protect his body. In other mammals the 
hair is a protection against rain, as is proved by the manner in 
which it is disposed, — a kind of argument, by the way, espe- 
cially prized by Cuvier, which has acquired great validity since 
Harvey's reasonings on the valves of the veins.* The backs 
of these animals are more especially protected in this way. 
But it is from the back more especially that the hairy cover- 
ing is' missed in the whole human race; and it is so effectually 
abolished as a character of the species, that it never occurs 
even by such reversions to ancestral types as are often exhib- 
ited in animal races. How could this covering have ever been 

* It is remarkable that our author should be so willing to attribute such a slight and 
unimportant character as the hair of animals, and even the lay of it, to Natural Selec- 
tion, and, at the same time, should regard the absence of it from the human back as be- 
yond the resources of natural exp'anations. We credit him, nevertheless, with the 
clearest appreciation, through his studies and reflections, of the extent of the action of 
•he law which he independently discovered; which comprises in its scope, not merely 
the stern necessities of mere existence, but the gentlest amenities of the most favored 
life. Sexual Selection, with all its obscure and subtle influences, is a type of this gen- 
tler action, which ranges all the way in its command of fitnesses from the hard necessi- 
ties of utility and warfare to the apparently useless superfluities of beauty and affection. 
Nay, more, a defect which, without subtracting from the attractions or any other im- 
portant external advantage in an animal, should simply be the source of private discom- 
fort to it, is certain to come under the judgments of this all-searching principle. 

It is a fair objection, however, sometimes made against the theory of Natural Selec- 
tion, that it abounds in loopholes of ingenious escape from the puzzling problems of na- 
ture ; and that, instead of giving real explanations of many phenomena, it simply refers 
them in general terms to obscure and little known, perhaps wholly inadequate causes, of 
which it holds omne iguohuii pro magiiijico. But this objection, though good, so far as 
it goes, against the theory, is not in favor of any rival hypothesis, least of all of that 
greatest of unknown causes, the supernatural, which is magnificent indeed in adequacy, 
if it be only real, but whose reality must rest forever on the negative evidence of the in- 
sufficiency, not only of the known, but of all possible natural explanations, and whose 
sufficiency even is, after all, only the counterpart or reflection of their apparent insuffi- 
ciencies. Hence the objection is a fair one only against certain phases of this theory, and 
against the tendency to rest satisfied with its imperfect explanations, or to regard them 
lightly as trivial defects. But to such criticisms the progress of the theory itself, in the 
study of nature, is a sufficient answer in general, and is a triumphant vindication of the 
mode of inquiry, against which such criticisms are sometimes unjustly made. 



106 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

injurious, or other than useful to men ? Or, if at any time in 
the past history of the race it was for any unknown reason in- 
jurious, why should not the race, or at least some part of it, 
have recovered from the loss and acquired anew so important 
a protection ? Mr. Wallace is not unmindful of Mr. Darwin's 
doctrine of Correlated Variation, and the explanation it affords 
of useless and even injurious characters in animals; but he 
limits his consideration of it to the supposition that the loss of 
hair by the race might have been a physiological consequence 
of correlation with some past unknown hurtful qualities. From 
such a loss, however, he argues, the race ought to have recov- 
ered. But he omits to consider the possible correlation of the 
absence of hair with qualities not necessarily injurious, but 
useful, which remain and equally distinguish the race. Many 
correlated variations are quite inexplicable. "Some are quite 
whimsical: thus cats, which are entirely white and have blue 
eyes, are generally deaf," and very few instances could be an- 
ticipated from known physiological laws, such as homological 
relations. There is, however, a case in point, cited by Mr. 
Darwin, the correlation of imperfect teeth with the nakedness 
of the hairless Turkish dog. If the intermediate varieties be- 
tween men and the man-apes had been preserved, and a regu- 
lar connection between the sizes of their brains, or develop- 
ments of the nervous system, and the amount of hair on their 
backs were observed, this would be as good evidence of cor- 
relation between these two characters as that which exists in 
most cases of correlation. But how in the absence of any 
evidence to test this or any other hypothesis, can Mr. Wal- 
lace presume to say that the law of Natural Selection cannot 
explain such a peculiarity? It may be that no valid proof is 
possible of any such explanation, but how is he warranted in 
assuming on that account some exceptional and wholly occult 
cause for it? There is a kind of correlation between the pres- 
ence of brains and the absence of hair which is not of so ob- 
scure a nature, and may serve to explain in part, at least, why 
Natural' Selection has not restored the protection of a hairy 
coat, however it may have been lost. Mr. Wallace himself 



LIMITS OF NATURAL SELECTION. 107 

signalizes this correlation in the preceding essay. It is that 
through which art supplies to man in a thousand ways the de- 
ficiencies of nature, and supersedes the action of Natural Se- 
lection. Every savage protects his back by artificial coverings. 
Mr. Wallace cites this fact as a proof that the loss of hair is a 
defect which Natural Selection ought to remedy. But why 
should Natural Selection remedy what art has already cared 
for? In this essay Mr. Wallace seems to us to have laid aside 
his usual scientific caution and acuteness, and to have devoted 
his powers to the service of that superstitious reverence for 
human nature which, not content with prizing at their worth the 
actual qualities and acquisitions of humanity, desires to intrench 
them with a deep and metaphysical line of demarkation. 

There are, doubtless, many and very important limitations 
to the action of Natural Selection, which the enthusiastic stu- 
dent of the science ought to bear in mind ; but they belong to 
the application of the principle of utility to other cases as well 
as to that of the derivation of human nature. Mr. Wallace 
regards the vocal powers of the human larynx as beyond the 
generative action of Natural Selection, since the savage neither 
uses nor appreciates all its powers. But the same observation 
applies as well to birds, for certain species, as he says in his 
essay on "The Philosophy of Birds' Nests," " which have natu- 
rally little variety of song, are ready in confinement to learn 
from other species, and become much better songsters." It 
would not be difficult to prove that the musical capacities of the 
human voice involve no elementary qualities which are not 
involved in the cadences of speech, and in such other powers 
of expression as are useful at least, if not indispensable, in lan- 
guage. There are many consequences of the ultimate laws or 
uniformities of nature, through which the acquisition of one 
useful power will bring with it many resulting advantages, as 
well as limiting disadvantages, actual or possible, which the 
principle of utility may not have comprehended in its action. 
This principle necessarily presupposes a basis in an antecedent 
constitution of nature, in principles of fitness, and laws of 
cause and effect, in the origin of which it has had no agency. 



IC 8 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

The question of the origin of this constitution, if it be a proper 
question, belongs to metaphysical philosophy, or, at least, to 
its pretensions. Strictly speaking, Natural Selection is not a 
cause at all, but is the mode of operation of a certain quite 
limited class of causes.* Natural Selection never made it 
come to pass, as a habit of nature, that an unsupported stone 
should move downwards rather than upwards. It applies to 
no part of inorganic nature, and is very limited even in the 
phenomena of organic life. 

In his obvious anxiety to establish for the worth of human 
nature the additional dignity of metaphysical isolation, Mr. 
Wallace maintains the extraordinary thesis that "the brain of 

* Though very limited in extent, this class is marked out only by the single character, 
that the efficient causes (of whatever nature, whether the forces of simple growth and re- 
production, or the agency of the human will), are yet of such a nature as to act through 
the principles of utility and choice. It includes in its range, therefore, developments of 
the simplest adaptive organic characters on one hand, and the growths of language and 
other human customs on the other. It has been objected that Natural Selection does 
not apply to the origin of languages, because language is an invention, and the work of 
the human will ; and it is clear, indeed, that Natural, as distinguished from Artificial, 
Selection is not properly the cause of language, or of the custom of speech. But to this 
it is sufficient to reply, that the contrast of Natural and Artificial Selections is not a con- 
trast of principles, but only of illustrations, and that the common principle of " the 
survival of the fittest" is named by Synecdoche from the broader though more obscure 
illustration of it. If it can be shown that the choice of a word from among many words 
as the name of an object or idea, or the choice of a dialect from among many varie- 
ties of speech, as the language of literature, is a universal process in the developments of 
speech and is determined by real, though special grounds of fitness, then this choice is 
a proper illustration of the principle of Natural Selection ; and is the more so, with 
reference to the name of the principle, in proportion as the process and the grounds of 
fitness in this choice differ from the common volitions and motives of men, or are ob- 
scured by the imperfections of the records of the past, or by the subtleties of the associa- 
tions which have determined it in the minds of the inventors and adopters of language. 
It is important, however, to distinguish between the origins of languages or linguistic 
customs, which are questions of philology, and the psychological question of the origin 
of language in general, or the origin in human nature of the inventions and uses of 
speech. Whether Natural Selection will serve to solve the latter question remains to be 
seen. In connection, however, with the resemblance, here noted, between the primitive, 
but regularly determined inventions of the mind and Natural Selection in its narrower 
sense, it is interesting to observe a corresponding resemblance between the theories of 
Free-Will and Creation, which are opposed to them. The objection that the origin of 
languages does not belong to the inquiries of Natural Selection, because language is an 
invention, and the work of Free-Will, thus appears to be parallel to the objection to 
Natural Selection, that it attempts to explain the work of Creation ; and both objections 
obviously beg the questions at issue. But both objections have force with reference to 
the real and proper limitations of Natural Selection, and to the antecedent conditions of 
its action. 



LIMITS OF NATURAL SELECTION I09 

the savage is larger than he needs it to be " ; from which he 
would conclude that there is in the size of the savage's brain a 
special anticipation or prophecy of the civilized man, or even of 
the philosopher, though the inference would be far more natural, 
and entirely consistent with Natural Selection, that the savage 
has degenerated from a more advanced condition. The proofs 
of our author's position consist in showing that there is a very 
slight difference between the average size of the savage's brain 
and that of the European, and that even in prehistoric man 
the capacity of the skull approaches very near to that of the 
modern man, as compared to the largest capacity of anthropoid 
skulls. Again, the size of the brain is a measure of intellectual 
power, as proved by the small size of idiotic brains, and the 
more than average size of the brains of great men, or "those 
who combine acute perception with great reflective powers, 
strong passions, and general energy of character." By these 
considerations " the idea is suggested of a surplusage of pow- 
er, of an instrument beyond the needs of its possessor." 
From a rather artificial and arbitrary measure of intellectual 
power, the scale of marks in university examinations, as com- 
pared to the range of sizes in brains, Mr. Wallace concludes it 
to be fairly inferred, "that the savage possesses a brain capa- 
ble, if cultivated and developed, of performing work of a kind 
and degree far beyond what he ever requires it to do." But 
how far removed is this conclusion from the idea that the 
savage has more brains than he needs! Why may it not be 
that all that he can do with his brains beyond his needs is only 
incidental to the powers which are directly serviceable ? Of 
what significance is it that his brain is twice as great as that 
of the man-ape, while the philosopher only surpasses him one 
sixth, so long as we have no real measure of the brain power 
implied in the one universal characteristic of humanity, the 
power of language, — that is, the power to invent and use 
arbitrary signs ? 

Mr. Wallace most unaccountably overlooks the significance 
of what has always been regarded as the most important dis- 
tinction of the human race, — its rationality as shown in Ian- 



HO PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

guage. He even says that " the mental requirements of sav- 
ages, and the faculties actually exercised by them, are very 
little above those of animals." We would not call in question 
the accuracy of Mr. Wallace's observations of savages; but we 
can hardly accord equal credit to his accuracy in estimating 
the mental rank of their faculties. No doubt the savage mind 
seems very dull as compared with the sagacity shown by many 
animals; but a psychological analysis of the faculty of lan- 
guage shows that even the smallest proficiency in it might re- 
quire more brain power than the greatest in any other direc- 
tion. For this faculty implies a complete inversion of the or- 
dinary and natural orders of association in the mind, or such 
an inversion as in mere parroting would be implied by the rep- 
etition of the words of a sentence in an inverse order, — a most 
difficult feat even for a philosopher. "The power of abstract 
reasoning and ideal conception," which Mr. Wallace esteems as 
a very great advance on the savage's proficiency, is but another 
step in the same direction, and here, too, ce n'est que le premier 
pas qui coute. It seems probable enough that brain power 
proper, or its spontaneous and internal determinations of the 
perceptive faculties, should afford directly that use or command 
of a sign which is implied in language, and essentially consists 
in the power of turning back the attention from a suggested 
fact or idea to the suggesting ones, with reference to their use, 
in place of the naturally passive following and subserviency of 
the mind to the orders of first impressions and associations. 
By inverting the proportions which the latter bear to the forces 
of internal impressions, or to the powers of imagination in an- 
imals, we should have a fundamentally new order of mental 
actions; which, with the requisite motives to them, such as the 
social nature of man would afford, might go far towards defin- 
ing the relations, both mental and physical, of human races to 
the higher brute animals. Among these the most sagacious 
and social, though they may understand language, or follow 
its significations, and even by indirection acquire some of its 
uses, yet have no direct power of using, and no power of in- 



LIMITS OF NATURAL SELECTION. m 

But as we do not know, and have no means of knowing, 
what is the quantity of intellectual power, as measured by 
brains, which even the simplest use of language requires, how 
shall we be able to measure on such a scale the difference be- 
tween the savage and the philosopher; which consists, net so 
much in additional elementary faculties in the philosopher, as in 
a more active and persistent use of such faculties as are com- 
mon to both; and depends on the external inheritances of civ- 
ilization, rather than on the organic inheritances of the civilized 
man ? It is the kind of mental acquisition of which a race 
may be capable, rather than the amount which a trained indi- 
vidual may acquire, that we should suppose to be more imme- 
diately measured by the size of the brain; and Mr. Wallace has 
not shown that this kind is not serviceable to the savage. Idiots 
have sometimes great powers of acquisition of a certain low 
order of facts and ideas. Evidence upon this , point, from the 
relations of intellectual power to the growth of the brain in 
children, is complicated in the same way by the fact that pow- 
ers of acquisitions are with difficulty distinguished from, and 
are not a proper measure of, the intellectual powers, which de- 
pend directly on organic conditions, and are independent of 
an external inheritance. 

But Mr. Wallace follows, in his estimations of distinct men- 
tal faculties, the doctrines of a school of mental philosophy 
which multiplies the elementary faculties of the mind far be- 
yond any necessity. Many faculties are regarded by this 
school as distinct, which are probably only simple combinations 
or easy extensions of other faculties. The philosopher's men- 
tal powers are not necessarily different in their elements from 
those which the savage has and needs in his struggle for exist- 
ence, or to maintain his position in the scale of life and the re- 
sources on which he has come to depend. The philosopher's 
powers are not, it is true, the direct results of Natural Selection, 
or of utility ; but may they not result by the elementary laws 
of mental natures and external circumstances, from faculties 
that are useful ? If they imply faculties which are useless to 
the savage, we have still the natural alternative left us, which 
Mr. Wallace does not consider, that savages, or all the races of 



H2 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

savages now living, are degenerate men, and not the proper 
representatives of the philosopher's ancestors. But this alter- 
native, though the natural one, does not appear to us as neces- 
sary; for we are not convinced that "the power of conceiving 
eternity and infinity, and all those purely abstract notions of 
form, number, and harmony, which play so large a part in the 
life of civilized races," are really so " entirely outside of the 
world of thought of the savage" as our author thinks. Are 
they not rather implied and virtually acquired in the powers 
that the savage has and needs, — his powers of inventing and 
using even the concrete terms of his simple language ? The 
fact that it does not require Natural Selection, but only the 
education of the individual savage, to develop in him these 
results, is to us a proof, not that the savage is specially provided 
with faculties beyond his needs, nor even that he is degenerated, 
but that mind itself, or elementary mental natures, in the sav- 
age and throughout the whole sentient world, involve and im- 
ply such relations between actual and potential faculties; just 
as the elementary laws of physics involve many apparently, or 
at first sight distinct and independent applications and utilities. 
Ought we to regard the principle of " suction," applied to the 
uses of life in so many and various animal organisms, as spe- 
cially prophetic of the mechanical invention of the pump and 
of similar engines? Shall we say that in the power of "suc- 
tion " an animal possesses faculties that he does not need ? 
Natural Selection cannot, it is true, be credited with such re- 
lations in development. But neither can they be attributed 
to a special providence in any intelligible sense. They belong 
rather to that constitution of nature, or general providence, 
which Natural Selection presupposes. 

The theories of associational psychology are so admirably 
adapted to the solution of problems, for which Mr. Wallace 
seems obliged to call in the aid of miracles, that we are sur- 
prised he was not led by his studies to a more careful consid- 
eration of them. Thus in regard to the nature of the moral 
sense, which Mr. Wallace defines in accordance with the intui- 
tional theory as "a feeling, — a sense of right and wrong, — in 
our nature, antecedent to, and independent of, experiences of 



LIMITS OF NATURAL SELECTION. 



113 



utility," — this sense is capable of an analysis which meets and 
answers very simply the difficulties he finds in it on the theory 
of Natural Selection. The existence of feelings of approval 
and disapproval, or of likings and aversions to certain classes 
of actions, and a sense of obligation, are eminently useful in 
the government of human society, even among savages. These 
feelings may be associated with the really useful and the 
really harmful classes of actions, or they may not be. Such 
associations are not determined simply by utility, any oftener 
than beliefs are by proper evidence. But utility tends to pro- 
duce the proper associations ; and in this, along with the in- 
crease of these feelings themselves, consists the moral progress 
of the race. Why should not a fine sense of honor and an un- 
compromising veracity be found, then, among savage tribes, as 
in certain instances cited by Mr. Wallace; since moral feelings, 
or the motives to the observance of rules of conduct, lie at the 
foundation of even the simplest human society, and rest directly 
on the utility of man's political nature ; and since veracity and 
honor are not merely 1 useful, but indispensable in many rela- 
tions, even in savage lives ? Besides, veracity being one of 
the earliest developed instincts of childhood, can hardly with 
propriety be regarded as an original moral instinct, since it 
matures much earlier than the sense of obligation, or any feel- 
ing of the sanctity of truth. It belongs rather to that social 
and intellectual part of human nature from which language it- 
self arises. The desire of communication, and the desire of 
communicating the truth, are originally identical in the ingen- 
uous social nature. Is not this the source of the "mystical 
sense of wrong," attached to untruthfulness, which is, after all, 
regarded by mankind at large as so venial a fault ? It needs 
but little early moral discipline to convert into a strong moral 
sentiment so natural an instinct. Deceitfulness is rather the 
acquired quality, so far as utility acts directly on the develop- 
ment of the individual, and for his advantage ; but the native 
instinct of veracity is founded on the more primitive utilities of 
society and human intercourse. Instead, then, of regarding 
veracity as an original moral instinct, "antecedent to, and in- 
dependent of, experiences of utility," it appears to us more 



II4 • PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

natural to regard it as originally an intellectual and social in- 
stinct, founded in the broadest and most fundamental utilities 
of human nature. 

The extension of the moral nature beyond the bounds of 
the necessities and utilities of society does not require a mir- 
acle to account for it ; since, according to the principles of 
the associational psychology, it follows necessarily from the 
elementary laws of the mind. The individual experiences 
of utility which attach the moral feelings to rules of conduct 
are more commonly those of rewards and punishments, than 
of the direct or natural consequences of the conduct itself; 
and associations thus formed come to supersede all conscious 
reference to rational ends, and act upon the will in the man- 
ner of an instinct. The uncalculating, uncompromising moral 
imperative is not, it is true, derived from the individual's 
direct experiences of its utility ; but neither does the instinct 
of the bee, which sacrifices its life in stinging, bear any relation 
to its individual advantage. Are we warranted, then, in infer- 
ring that the sting is useless to the bee ? Suppose that whole 
communities of bees should occasionally be sacrificed to their 
instinct of self-defense, would this prove their instinct to be in- 
dependent of a past or present utility, or to be prophetic of 
some future development of the race ? Yet such a conclusion 
would be exactly parallel to that which Mr. Wallace draws 
from the fact that savages some times deal honorably with their 
enemies to their own apparent disadvantage. It is a universal 
law of the organic world, and a necessary consequence of Nat- 
ural Selection, that the individual comprises in its nature 
chiefly what is useful to the race, and only incidentally what 
is useful to itself; since it is the race, and not the individual, 
that endures or is preserved. This contrast is the more 
marked in proportion as. a race exhibits a complicated polity 
or social form of life ; and man, even in his savage state, " is 
more political than any bee or ant." The doctrine of Natu- 
ral Selection awakens a new interest in the problems of psy- 
chology. Its inquiries are not limited to the origin of species. 
" In the distant future," says Mr. Darwin. "I see open fields 
for far more important researches. Psychology will be based 



LIMITS OF NA TURAL SELECTION. 



"5 



7- 



on a new foundation. — that of the necessary acquirements of 
each mental power and capacity by gradation. Light will be 
thrown on the origin of man and his history." More light we 
are sure can be expected from such researches than has been 
discovered by Mr. Wallace, in the principles and analysis of a 
mystical and metaphysical psychology. 

The " origin of consciousness," or of sensation and thought, 
is relegated similarly by Mr. Wallace to the immediate agency 
or interposition of a metaphysical cause, as being beyond the 
province of secondary causes, which could act to produce it 
under the principle of Natural Selection. And it is doubtless 
true, nay, unquestionable, that sensation as a simple nature, 
with the most elementary- laws of its activity, does really belong 
to the primordial facts in that constitution of nature, which is 
presupposed by the principle of utility as the ground or condi- 
tion of the fitnesses through which the principle acts. In like 
manner the elements of organization, or the capacities of living 
matter in general, must be posited as antecedent to the mode 
of action which has produced in it, and through its elementary 
laws, such marvelous results. But if we mean by "conscious- 
ness" what the word is often and more properly used to ex- 
press, — that total and complex structure of sensibilities, 
thoughts, and emotions in an animal mind, which is so closely 
related to the animal's complex physical organization, — so far 
is this from being beyond the province of Natural Selection, 
that it affords one of the most promising fields for its future 
investigations.* Whatever the results of such investigations, 

* In further illustration of the range of the explanations afforded by the principle of 
Natural Selection, to which we referred in our note, page 108, we may instance an ap- 
plication of it to the more special psychological problem of the development of the indi- 
vidual mind by its own experiences, which presupposes, of course, the innate powers and 
mental faculties derived (whether naturally or supernaturally) from the development x>f 
the race. Among these native faculties of the individual mind is the power of reproducing 
its own pasl experiences in memory and belief; and this is, at least, analogous, as we 
have said, to the reproductive powers of physical organisms, and like these is in itself 
an unlimited, expansive power of repetition. Human beliefs, like human desires, are 
naturally illimitable. The generalizing instinct is native to the mind. It is not the result 
of habitual experiences, as is commonly supposed, but acts as well on single experiences, 
which are capable of producing, when unchecked, the most unbounded beliefs and ex- 
pectations of the future. The only checks to such unconditional natural beliefs a.reot/ier 
and equally unconditional and natural beliefs, or the contradictions and limiting condi- 
tions of experience. Here, then, is a close analogy, at least, to those fundamental facts 



n6 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

we may rest assured that they will not solve ; will never even 
propound the problem peculiar to metaphysics (if it can prop- 

of the organic world on which the law of Natural Selection is based ; the facts, namely, 
of the "rapid increase of organisms," limited only by "the conditions of existence," and 
by competition in that "struggle for existence" which results in the "survival of the 
fittest." As the tendency to an unlimited increase in existing organisms is held in check 
only by those conditions of their existence which are chiefly comprised in the like tend- 
encies of other organisms to unlimited increase, and is thus maintained (so long as ex- 
ternal conditions remain unchanged) in an unvarying balance of life ; and as this balance 
adjusts itself to slowly changing external conditions, so, in the history of the individual 
mind, beliefs which spring spontaneously from simple and single experiences, and from a 
naturally unlimited tendency to generalization, are held mutually in check, and in their 
harmony represent the properly balanced experiences and knowledges of the mind, and by 
adaptive changes are kept in accordance with changing external conditions, or with 
the varying total results in the memory of special experiences. This mutual limitation of 
belief by belief, in which consists so large a part of their proper evidence, is so prominent 
a feature in the beliefs of the rational mind, that philosophers had failed to discover their 
true nature, as elementary facts, until this was pointed out by the greatest of living psy- 
chologists, Professor Alexander Bain. The mutual tests and checks of belief have, in- 
deed, always appeared to a great majority of philosophers as their only proper evidence; 
and beliefs themselves have appeared as purely intellectual phases of the mind. But 
Bain has defined them, in respect to their ultimate natures, as phases of the will ; or as 
the tendencies we have to act on mere experience, or to act on our simplest, most limited 
experiences. They are tendencies, however, which become so involved in intellectual de- 
velopments, and in their mutual limitations, that their ultimate results in rational beliefs 
have very naturally appeared to most philosophers as purely intellectual facts ; and their 
real genesis in experience has been generally discredited, with the exception of what are 
designated specially as " empirical beliefs." 

It may be objected that the generative process we have here described bears only a 
remote and fanciful analogy, and not an essential resemblance, to Natural Selection in the 
organic world. But to this it is, perhaps, sufficient to reply (as in the case of the origin 
of language), that if "the survival of the fittest" is a true expression of the law, — it is to 
Mr. Herbert Spencer we owe this most precise definition, — then the development of the 
individual mind presents a true example of it; for our knowledges and rational beliefs re- 
sult, truly and literally, from the survival of the fittest among our original and sponta- 
neous beliefs. It is only by a figure of speech, it" is true, that this "survival of the fittest" 
can be described as the result of a "struggle for existence " among our primitive beliefs; 
but this description is equally figurative as applied to Natural Selection in the organic 
world. 

The application of the principle to mental development takes for granted, as we have 
said, the faculties with which the individual is born, and in the human mind these include V 
that most efficient auxiliary, the faculty of using and inventing language. How Natu- 
ral Selection could have originated this is not so easy to trace, and is an almost wholly 
speculative question ; but if the faculty consists essentially, as we have supposed, in a 
preponderance of the active and spontaneous over the passive powers of the brain, effect- 
ing the turning-back or reflective action of the mind, while the latter simply result in the 
following-out or sagacious habit, we see at least that the contrast need not depend on the 
absolute size of the brain, but only on the proportion of the powers that depend on its quan- 
tity to those that depend on its quality. We should naturally suppose, therefore, that the 
earliest men were probably not very sagacious creatures, perhaps much less so than the 
present uncivilized races. But they were, most likely, very social ; even more so, perhaps, 
than the sagacious savage ; for there was needed a strong motive to call this complicated 
and difficult mental action into exercise ; and it is even now to be observed that sagacity and 



LIMITS OF NA TURA L SELECTION. j 1 7 

erly be called a problem), the origin of sensation or simple con- 
sciousness, the problem par excellence of pedantic garrulity or 
philosophical childishness. Questions of the special physical 
antecedents, concomitants, and consequents of special sensa- 
tions will doubtless continue to be the legitimate objects of 
empirical researches and of important generalizations; and 
such researches may succeed in reducing all other facts of actual 
experience, all our knowledge of nature, and all our thoughts 
and emotions to intelligible modifications of these simple and 
fundamental existences; but the attempt to reduce sensation 
to anything but sensation is as gratuitous and as devoid of any 
suggestion or guidance of experience, as the attempt to reduce 
the axioms of the mathematical or mechanical sciences to 
simpler orders of universal facts. In one sense material phe- 
nomena, or physical objective states, are causes or effects of 
sensations, bearing as they do the invariable relations to them 
of antecedents, or concomitants, or consequents. But these 
are essentially empirical relations, explicable perhaps by more 
and more generalized empirical laws, but approaching in this 
way never one step nearer to an explanation of material con- 
ditions by mental laws, or of mental natures by the forces of 
matter. Matter and mind co-exist. There are no scientific 
principles by which either can be determined to be the cause 

sociability are not commonly united in high degrees even among civilized men. Growths 
both in the quantity and quality of the brain are, therefore, equally probable in the history of 
human development, with always a preponderance of the advantages which depend upon 
quantity. But the present superiority of the most civilized races, so far as it is independent 
cf any external inheritance of arts, knowledges, and institutions, would appear to depend 
. chiefly upon the quality of their brains, and upon characteristics belonging to their moral 
and emotional natures rather than the intellectual, since the intellectual acquisitions of 
civilization are more easily communicated by education to the savage than the refine- 
ments of its moral and emotional characteristics. Though all records and traces of this 
development are gone, and a wide gulf separates the lowest man from the highest brute 
animal, yet elements exist by which we may trace the succession of utilities and advan- 
tages that have determined the transition. The most essential are those of the social nat- 
ure of man, involving mutual assistance in the struggle for existence. Instrumental to 
these are his mental powers, developed by his social nature, and by the reflective char- 
acter of his brain's action into a general and common intelligence, instead of the special- 
ized instincts and sagacities characteristic of other animals; and from these came lan- 
guage, and thence all the arts, knowledges, governments, traditions, all the external in- 
heritances, which, reacting on his social nature, have induced the sentiments of morality, 
worship, and refinement; at which gazing as in a mirror he sees his past, and thinks it 
his future. 



1 1 8 PHIL OSOPHICA L DISCUSSIONS. 

of the other. Still, so far as scientific evidence goes, mind ex- 
ists in direct and peculiar relations to a certain form of matter, 
the organic, which is not a different kind, though the proper- 
ties of no other forms are in themselves capable, so far as sci- 
entific observation has yet determined, of giving rise to it. 
The materials and the forces of organisms are both derived 
from other forms of matter, as well as from the organic ; but 
the organic form itself appears to be limited to the productive 
powers of matters and forces which already have this form. 
The transcendental doctrine of development (which is not 
wholly transcendental, since it is guided, at least vaguely, by the 
scientific principles of cause and effect, or by the continuities 
and uniformities of natural phenomena) assumes that in the 
past course of nature the forms as well as the materials and 
forces of organic matter had at one time a causal connection 
with other forms of material existence. Mental natures, and 
especially the simplest, or sensations, would have had, accord- 
ing to this assumption, a more universal relation of immediate 
connection than we now know with properties of the sort that 
we call material. Still, by the analogies of experience they 
cannot be regarded as having been either causes or effects of 
them. Our ignorances, or the as yet unexplored possibilities 
of nature, seem far preferable to the vagueness of this theory, 
which, in addition to the continuities and uniformities univer- 
sally exhibited in nature, assumes transcendentally, as a uni- 
versal first principle, the law of progressive change, or a law 
which is not universally exemplified by the course of nature. 
We say, and say truly, that a stone has no sensation, since it 
exhibits none of the signs that indicate the existence of sensa- 
tions. It is not only a purely objective existence, like every- 
thing else in nature, except our own individual self-consciousness, 
but its properties indicate to us no other than this purely ob- 
jective existence, unless it be the existence of God. To suppose 
that its properties could possibly result in a sensitive nature, not 
previously existing or co-existing with them, is to reason entirely 
beyond the guidance and analogies of experience. It is a purely 
gratuitous supposition, not only metaphysical or transcendental, 
but also materialistic ; that is, it is not only asking a foolish ques- 



LIMITS OF NATURAL SELECTION. 



119 



tion, but giving a still more foolish answer to it. In short, the 
metaphysical problem may be reduced to an attempt to break 
down the most fundamental antithesis of all experience, by de- 
manding to know of its terms which of them is the other. To 
this sort of fatuity belongs, we think, the mystical doctrine which 
Mr. Wallace is inclined to adopt, "that force is a product of 
mind" ; which means, so far as it is intelligible, that forces, or 
the physical antecedents and conditions of motion (appre- 
hended, it is true, along with motion itself, through our sensa- 
tions and volitions), yet bear to our mental natures the still 
closer relation of resemblance to the prime agency of the Will ; 
or it means that "all force is probably will-force." Not only 
does this assumed mystical resemblance, expressed by the word 
"will-force," contradict the fundamental antithesis of subject 
and object phenomena (as the word "mind-matter" would), 
but it fails to receive any confirmation from the law of the 
correlation of the physical forces. All the motions of animals, 
both voluntary and in voluntary,, are traceable to the efficiency 
of equivalent material forces in the animal's physical organiza- 
tion. The cycles of equivalent physical forces are complete, 
even when their courses lie through the voluntary actions of 
animals, without the introduction of conscious or mental con- 
ditions. The sense of effort is not a form of force. The pain- 
ful or pleasurable sensations that accompany the conversions 
of force in conscious volitions are not a consciousness of this 
force itself, nor even a proper measure of it. The Will is not a 
measurable quantity of energy, with its equivalents in terms of 
heat, or falling-force, or chemical affinity, or the energy of mo- 
tion, unless we identify it with the vital energies of the organ- 
ism, which are, however (unfortunately for this hypothesis), the 
causes of the involuntary movements of an animal, as well as 
of its proper volitions considered from their physical side. 

But Mr. Wallace is inclined to the opinion that the Will is 
an incident force, regulating and controlling the action of the 
physical forces of the vital machine, but contributing, even in 
this capacity, some part at least to the actual moving forces of 
the living frame. He says: 

"However delicately a machine may be constructed, with the most ex- 



120 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

quisitely contrived detents to release a weight or spring by the exertion 
of the smallest possible amount of force, some external force will always 
be required; so in the animal machine, however minute may be ihe 
changes required in the cells or fibres of the brain, to set in motion the 
nerve currents that loosen or excite the pent-up forces of certain muscles, 
some force must be required to effect those changes." 
And this force he supposes to be the Will. This is the most in- 
telligible materialism we have ever met with in the discussions 
of this subject. It is true that in a machine, not only the main 
efficient forces, but also the incident and regulating ones, are 
physical forces; and however small the latter may be, they are 
still of the same nature, and are comparable in amount with 
the main efficient forces. But is not this one of the most es- 
sential differences between a machine and a sensitive organ- 
ism ? Is it impossible, then, that nature has contrived an in- 
finitely more perfect machine than human art can invent, — 
machinery which involves the powers of art itself, if it be 
proper to call that contrivance a machine, in which the regu- 
lating causes are of a wholly different nature from the efficient 
forces? May it not be that sensations and mental conditions, 
generally, are regulating causes which add nothing, like the 
force of the hand of the engineer to the powers which he con- 
trols in his machine, and subtract nothing, as an automatic ap- 
paratus does, from such powers in the further regulation of the 
machine? We may not be able to understand how such reg- 
ulation is possible; how sensations and other mental conditions 
can restrain, excite, and combine the conversions of physical 
forces in the cycles into which they themselves do not enter; 
though there is a type of such regulation in the principles of 
theoretical mechanics, in the actions of forces which do not af- 
fect the quantities of the actual or potential energies of a sys- 
tem of moving bodies, but simply the form of the movement, 
as in the rod of the simple pendulum. Such regulation in the 
sensitive organism is more likely to be an ultimate inexplicable 
fact; but it is clear that even in a machine the amounts of the 
regulating forces bear no definite relations to the powers they 
control, and might, so far as these are directly concerned, be 
reduced to nothing as forces; and in many cases they are re- 
duced to a minimum of the force of friction. They must, 



LIMITS OF NA TURA L SELE C TWIST. 121 

however, be something in amount in a machine, because they are 
physical, and, like all physical forces, must be derived in 
quantity from pre-existing forms of force. To infer from this 
that the Will must add something to the forces of the organism 
is, therefore, to assume for it a material nature. But Mr. 
Wallace escapes, or appears to think (as others think who hold 
this view) that he escapes, from complete materialism by the 
doctrine of the freedom of the Will. Though he makes the 
Will an efficient physical force, he does not allow it to be a 
physical effect. In other words, he regards the Will as an ab- 
solute source of physical energy, continually adding, though in 
small amounts, to the store of the forces of nature; a sort of 
molecular leakage of energy from an absolute source into the 
nervous system of animals, or, at least, of men. This, though 
in our opinion an unnecessary and very improbable hypothesis, 
is not inconceivable. It is improbable, inasmuch as it denies 
to the Will a character common to the physical forces with 
which the Will is otherwise assimilated by this theory, — the 
character, namely, of being an effect in measurable amount as 
well as a cause, or the character of belonging to cycles of 
changes related by invariable quantities; but as we do not re- 
gard the conservation of force as a necessary law of the uni- 
verse, we are able to comprehend Mr. Wallace's position. It 
is the metaphysical method of distinguishing a machine from 
a sensitive organism. But we do not see why Mr. Wallace is 
not driven by it to the dilemma of assuming free-wills for all 
sentient organisms; or else of assuming, with Descartes, that 
all but men are machines. The latter alternative would, 
doubtless, redound most effectively to the metaphysical digni- 
ty of human nature. Mr. Wallace appears to think that un- 
less we can attribute to the Will some efficiency or quantity of 
energy, its agency must be regarded as a nullity, and our appar- 
ent consciousness of its influence as an illusion ; but this opin- 
ion appears to be based on the still broader assumption, which 
seems to us erroneous, that all causation is reducible to the 
conversions of equivalent physical energies. It may be true 
(at least we are not prepared to dispute the assumption) that 
every case of real causation involves such conversions or 
6 



I2 2 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

changes in forms of energy, or that every effect involves changes 
of position and motion. Nevertheless, every case of real 
causation may still involve also another mode of causation. 
A much simpler conception than our author's theory, 
and one that seems to us far more probable is that the 
phenomena of conscious volition involve in themselves no 
proper efficiencies or forces coming under the law of the 
conservation of force, but are rather natural types of causes, 
purely and absolutely regulative, which add nothing to,' and 
subtract nothing from, the quantities of natural forces. No 
doubt there is in the actions of the nervous system a much 
closer resemblance than this to a machine. No doubt it is 
automatically regulated, as well as moved, by physical 
forces ; but this is probably just in proportion as its agency 
— as in our habits and instincts — is removed from our con- 
scious control. All this machinery is below, beyond, ex- 
ternal, or foreign to our consciousness. The profoundest, most 
attentive introspection gains not a glimpse of its activity, nor 
do we ever dream of its existence; but both by the laws of its 
operations, and by the means through which we become 
aware of its existence, it stands in the broadest, most funda- 
mental contrast to our mental natures ; and these, so far from 
furnishing a type of physical efficiency in our conscious voli- 
tions, seem to us rather, in accordance with their general con- 
trast with material phenomena, to afford a type of purely reg- 
ulative causes, or of an absolutely forceless and unresisted 
control and regulation of those forces of nature which are 
comprised in the powers of organic life. Perhaps a still higher 
type of such regulation is to be found in those "laws of 
nature," which, without adding to, or subtracting from, the 
real forces of nature, determine the order of their conversions 
by "fixed, stated, or settled" rules of succession; and these 
may govern also, and probably do govern, the successions of 
our mental or self-conscious states, both in themselves and in 
their relations to material conditions. Simple, absolute, inva- 
riable rules of succession in phenomena, both physical and 
mental, constitute the most abstract conception we can have of 
causal relations ; but they appear under two chief classes, the 



LIMITS OF NATURAL SELECTION. 



123 



physical laws which determine the possible relations of the 
forms of force, and those which are also concerned in the still 
further determination of its actual orders of succession, or 
which, by their combinations in the intricate web of uniformities 
in nature, both mental and physical, determine the events in 
particular that in relation to the laws of force are only deter- 
mined in general. The proper laws of force, or of the con- 
versions of energy, are concerned exclusively with relations in 
space. Relations in time are governed by the other class of 
laws. Thus, in the abstract theory of the pendulum, the 
phenomena of force involved are limited simply to the vertical 
rise and fall of the weight, upon which alone the amounts of 
its motions depend. The times of its vibrations are deter- 
mined by the regulating length of the rod, which in theory adds 
nothing to, and subtracts nothing from, the efficient mutually 
convertible forces of motion and gravity. What is here 
assumed in theory to be true, we assume to be actually and 
absolutely true of mental agencies. 

But it may be said, and it often is said, " that this theory of 
the Will's agency is directly contradicted in both its features 
by consciousness; that we are immediately conscious both of 
energy and freedom in willing." There is much in our voli- 
tional consciousness to give countenance to this contradiction ; 
but it is only such as dreams give to contradictions of rational 
experience. The words " force," " energy," " effort," " resist- 
ance," " conflict," all point to states of feeling in our volitional 
consciousness which seem to a superficial observation to be 
true intuitions of spontaneous self-originated causes ; and it is 
only when these states of feeling are tested by the scientific 
definitions and the objective measure of forces, and by the 
orders of the conversions of force, that they are found to be 
only vague, subjective accompaniments, instead of distinct ob- 
jective apprehensions or perceptions of what "force" signifies 
in science. Such tests prove them to be like the complement- 
ary or subjective colors of vision. In one sense they are in- 
tuitions of force, our only intuitions of it (as the aspects of 
nature are our only intuitions of the system of the world) ; but 
they are not true perceptions, since they do not afford, each 



124 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



feeling in itself, definite and invariable indications of force as 
an objective existence, or as affecting all minds alike. Even 
the sense of weight is no proper measure of weight as an ele- 
ment of force ; and the muscular effort of lifting is only a 
vague and variable perception of this conversion of force, and 
does not afford even a hint of the great law of the conserva- 
tion and convertibility of forces, but, on the contrary, seems to 
contradict it. The muscular feeling of resistance to motion or 
to a change of motion is an equally vague measure of inertia. 
Indeed, the feelings of weight and resistance, which are often 
regarded as intuitions of gravity and inertia, are insusceptible 
of precise measurement or numerical comparison; and though 
capable of being trained to some degree of precision in esti- 
mating what is properly measured by other means, they could 
never have revealed through their unaided indications the law 
of the fixed and universal proportionality of these two forces. 
The feeling of effort itself (more or less intense, and more or 
less painful, according to circumstances, which are quite irrel- 
evant to its apparent effect) appears by the testimony of con- 
sciousness to be the immediate cause of the work which is 
done, — work really done by forces in the vital organism, 
which only the most recondite researches of science have dis- 
closed. But if this much-vaunted authority of immediate con- 
sciousness so blunders in even the simplest cases, how can our 
author or any judicious thinker trust its unconfirmed, unsup- 
ported testimony in regard to the agency of the Will ? Is it 
not like trusting the testimony of the senses as to the immo- 
bility of the earth ? . * 

With hardly a point, therefore, of Mr. Wallace's concluding 
essay are we able to agree; and this impresses us the more, 
since we find nothing in the rest of his book which appears to 
us to call for serious criticism, but many things, on the con- 
trary, which command our most cordial admiration. We ac- 
count for it by the supposition that his metaphysical views, 
carefully excluded from his scientific work, are the results of 
an earlier and less severe training than that which has secured 
to us his valuable positive contributions to the theory of Nat- 
ural Selection. Mr. Wallace himself is fully aware of this con- 



LIMITS OF NA TURAL SELECTION. 



™5 



trast, and anticipates a scornful rejection of his theory by many 
who in other respects agree with him. 

The doctrines of the special and prophetic providences and 
decrees of God, and of the metaphysical isolation of human 
nature, are based, after all, on barbaric conceptions of dignity, 
which are restricted in their application by every step forward 
in the progress of science. And the sense of security they 
give us of the most sacred things is more than replaced by the 
ever-growing sense of the universality of inviolable laws, — 
laws that underlie our sentiments and desires, as well as all 
that these can rationally regard in the outer world. It is un- 
fortunate that the prepossessions of religious sentiment in favor 
of metaphysical theories should make the progress of science 
always seem like an indignity to religion, or a detraction from 
what is held as most sacred; yet the responsibility for this be- 
longs neither to the progress of science nor to true religious 
sentiment, but to a false conservatism, an irrational respect for 
the ideas and motives of a philosophy which finds it more and 
more difficult with every advance of knowledge to reconcile 
its assumptions with facts of observation. 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES* 

♦ It is now, nearly twelve years since the discussion of that 
"mystery of mysteries," the origin of species, was re-opened by 
the publication of the first edition of Mr. Darwin's most re- 
markable work. Again and again in the history of scientific 
debate this question had been discussed, and, after exciting a 
short-lived interest, had been condemned by cautious and con- 
servative thinkers to the limbo of insoluble problems or to the 
realm of religious mystery. They had, therefore, sufficient 
grounds, a priori, for anticipating that a similar fate would 
attend this new revival of the question, and that, in a few- 
years, no more would be heard of the matter; that the same 
condemnation awaited this movement which had overwhelmed 
the venturesome speculations of Lamarck and of the author of 
the " Vestiges of Creation." This not unnatural anticipation 
has been, however, most signally disappointed. But what 
can we say has really been accomplished by this debate ; 
and what reasons have we for believing that the judgment 
of conservative thinkers will not, in the main, be proved 
right after all, though present indications are against them? 
One permanent consequence, at least, will remain, in the 
great additions to our knowledge of natural history, and of 
general physiology, or theoretical biology, which the discus- 
sion has produced; though the greater part of this positive 
contribution to science is still to be credited directly to Mr. 
Darwin's works, and even to his original researches. But, 
besides this, an advantage has been gained which cannot be 
too highly estimated. ( Orthodoxy has been won over to the 

* From the North American Review, July, 1871. 



/ 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 127 

doctrine of evolution. In asserting this result, however, we 
are obliged to make what will appear to many persons impor- 
tant qualifications and explanations. We do not mean that 
the heads of leading religious bodies, even in the most enlight- 
ened communities, are yet willing to withdraw the dogma that 
the origin of species is a special religous mystery, or even to 
assent to the hypothesis of evolution as a legitimate question 
for scientific inquiry. We mean only, that many eminent stu- 
dents of science, who claim to be orthodox, and who are cer- 
tainly actuated as much by a spirit of reverence as by scientific 
inquisitiveness, have found means of reconciling the general 
doctrine of evolution with the dogmas they regard as essential 
to religion. Even to those whose interest in the question is 
mainly scientific this result is a welcome one, as opening the 
way for a freer discussion of subordinate questions, less tram- 
meled by the religious prejudices which have so often been 
serious obstacles to the progress of scientific researches. 

But again, in congratulating ourselves on this result, we are 
obliged to limit it to the doctrine of evolution in its most gen- 
eral form, the theory common to Lamarck's zoological philos- 
ophy, to the views of the author of the " Vestiges of Creation," 
to the general conclusions of Mr. Darwin's and Mr. Wallace's 
theory of Natural Selection, to Mr. Spencer's general doctrine 
of evolution, and to a number of minor explanations of the 
processes by which races of animals and plants have been de- 
rived by descent from different ancestral forms. What is no 
longer regarded with suspicion as secretly hostile to religious 
beliefs by many truly religious thinkers is that which is denoted 
in common by the various names "transmutation," "develop- 
ment," "derivation," "evolution," and "descent with modifi- 
cation." These terms are synonymous in their primary and 
general signification, but refer secondarily to various hypoth- 
eses of the processes of derivation. But there is a choice 
among them on historical grounds, and with reference to as- 
sociations, which are of some importance from a theological 
point of view. "Transmutation" and "development" are 
under ban. "Derivation" is, perhaps, the most innocent 
word; though "evolution" will probably prevail, since, spite 



I2 8 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

of its etymological implication, it has lately become most' 
acceptable, not only to the theological critics of the theory,, 
but to its scientific advocates; although, from the neutral 
ground of experimental science, " descent with modification " 
is the most pertinent and least exceptionable name. 

While the general doctrine of evolution has thus been suc- 
cessfully redeemed from theological condemnation, this is not 
yet true of the subordinate hypothesis of Natural Selection, to 
the partial success of which this change of opinion is, in great 
measure, due. It is, at first sight, a paradox that the views 
most peculiar to the eminent naturalist, whose work has been 
chiefly instrumental in effecting this change of opinion, should 
still be rejected or regarded with suspicion by those who have 
nevertheless been led by him to adopt the general hypothesis, 
- — an hypothesis which his explanations have done so much to 
render credible. It would seem, at first sight, that Mr. Dar- 
win has won a victory, not for himself, but for Lamarck. 
Transmutation, it would seem, has been accepted, but Natural 
Selection, its explanation, is still rejected by many converts to 
the general theory, both on religious and scientific grounds. 
But too much weight might easily be attributed to the deduct- 
ive or explanatory part of the evidence, on which the doctrine 
of evolution has come to rest. In the half-century preceding 
the publication of the "Origin of Species," inductive evidence 
on the subject had accumulated, greatly outweighing all that 
was previously known; and the "Origin of Species" is not 
less remarkable as a compend and discussion of this evidence 
than for the ingenuity of its explanations. It is not, therefore, 
to what is now known as " Darwinism " that the prevalence of 
the doctrine of evolution is to be attributed, at least directly. 
Still, most of this effect is due to Mr. Darwin's work, and 
something undoubtedly to the indirect influence of reasonings 
that are regarded with distrust by those who accept their con- 
clusions ; for opinions are contagious, even where their reasons 
are resisted. 

The most effective general criticism of the theory of Natural 
Selection which has yet appeared, and, at the same time, one 
which is likely to exert great influence in overcoming the re- 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 129 

maining prejudice against the general doctrine of evolution, is 
the work of Mr. St. George Mivart " On the Genesis of 
Species." Though the work falls short of what we might have 
expected from an author of Mr. Mivart's attainments as a 
naturalist, yet his position before the religious world, and his 
unquestionable familiarity with the theological bearings of his 
subject, will undoubtedly gain for him and for the doctrine of 
evolution a hearing and a credit, which might be denied to 
the mere student of science. His work is mainly a critique of 
"Darwinism"; that is, of the theories peculiar to Mr. Darwin 
and the " Darwinians," as distinguished from the believers in 
the general doctrine of evolution which our author accepts. 
He also puts forward an hypothesis in opposition to Mr. Dar- 
win's doctrine of the predominant influence of Natural Selec- 
tion in the generation of organic species, and their relation to 
the conditions of their existence. On this hypothesis, called 
"Specific Genesis," an organism, though at any one time a 
fixed and determinate species, approximately adapted to sur- 
rounding conditions of existence, is potentially, and by innate 
potential combinations of organs and faculties, adapted to 
many other conditions of existence. It passes, according to 
the hypothesis, from one form to another of specific "mani- 
festation," abruptly and discontinuously in conformity to the 
emergencies of its outward life ; but in any condition to which 
it is tolerably adapted it retains a stable form, subject to varia- 
tion only within determinate limits, like oscillations in a stable 
equilibrium. For this conception our author is indebted to 
Mr. Galton, w 7 ho, in his work on " Hereditary Genius," "com- 
pares the development of species with a many-faceted spheroid 
tumbling over from one facet or stable equilibrium to another. 
The existence of internal conditions in animals," Mr. Mivart 
adds (p. in), "corresponding with such facets is denied by 
pure Darwinians, but it is contended in this work that some- 
thing may also be said for their existence." 

There are many facts of variation, numerous cases of abrupt 
changes in individuals both of natural and domesticated species, 
which, of course, no Darwinian or physiologist denies, and of 
which Natural Selection professes to offer no direct explanation. 



I3 o PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

The causes of these phenomena, and their relations to external 
conditions of existence, are matters quite independent of the 
principle of Natural Selection, except so far as they may di- 
rectly affect the animal's or plant's well-being, with the origin 
of which this principle is alone concerned. General physi- 
ology has classified some of these sudden variations under 
such names as "reversion" and "atavism," or returns more 
or less complete to ancestral forms. Others have been con- 
nected together under the law of "correlated or concomitant 
variations," changes that, when they take place, though not 
known to be physically dependent on each other, yet usually 
or often occur together. Some cases of this law have been re- 
ferred to the higher, more fundamental laws of homological 
variations, or variations occurring together on account of the 
relationships of homology, or due to similarities and physical 
relations between parts of organisms, in tissues, organic con- 
nections, and modes of growth. Other variations are explained 
by the laws and causes that determine monstrous growths. 
Others again are quite inexplicable as yet, or cannot yet be 
referred to any general law or any known antecedents. These 
comprise, indeed, the most common cases. The almost uni- 
versal prevalence of well-marked phenomena of variation in 
species, the absolutely universal fact that no two individual 
organisms are exactly alike, and that the description of a 
species is necessarily abstract and in many respects by means 
of averages, — these facts have received no particular expla- 
nations, and might indeed be taken as ultimate facts or highest 
laws in themselves, were it not that in biological speculations 
such an assumption would be likely to be misunderstood, as 
denying the existence of any real determining causes and more 
ultimate laws, as well as denying any known antecedents or 
regularities in such phenomena. No physical naturalist would 
for a moment be liable to such a misunderstanding, but would, 
on the contrary, be more likely to be off his guard against the 
possibility of it in minds otherwise trained and habituated to a 
different kind of studies. Mr. Darwin has undoubtedly erred 
in this respect. He has not in his works repeated with suffi- 
cient frequency his faith in the universality of the law of 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 



131 



causation, in the phenomena of general physiology or theoret- 
ical biology, as well as in all the rest of physical nature. He 
has not said often enough, it would appear, that in referring 
any effect to "accident," he only means that its causes are like 
particular phases of the weather, or like innumerable phenom- 
ena in the concrete course of nature generally, which are quite 
beyond the power of finite minds to anticipate or to account 
for in detail, though none the less really determinate or due to 
regular causes. That he has committed this error appears 
from the fact that his critic, Mr. Mivart, has made the mis- 
take, which nullifies nearly the whole of his criticism, of sup- 
posing that "the theory of Natural Selection may (though it 
need not) be taken in such a way as to lead men to regard 
the present organic world as formed, so to speak, accidentally, 
beautiful and wonderful as is confessedly the hap-hazard re- 
sult" (p. 33). Mr. Mivart, like many another writer, seems to 
forget the age of the world in which he lives and for which he 
writes, — the age of " experimental philosophy," the very stand- 
point of which, its fundamental assumption, is the universality 
of physical causation. This is so_ familiar to minds bred in 
physical studies, that they rarely imagine that they may be 
mistaken for disciples of Democritus, or for believers in " the 
fortuitous concourse of atoms," in the sense, at least, which 
theology has attached to this phrase. If they assent to the 
truth that may have been meant by the phrase, they would not 
for a moment suppose that the atoms move fortuitously, but 
only that their conjunctions, constituting the actual concrete 
orders of events, could not be anticipated except by a knowl- 
edge of the natures and regular histories of each and all of 
them, — such knowledge as belongs only to omniscience. The 
very hope of experimental philosophy, its expectation of con- 
structing the sciences into a true philosophy of nature, is based 
on the induction, or, if you please, the a priori presumption, 
that physical causation is universal; that the constitution of 
nature is written in its actual manifestations, and needs only to 
be deciphered by experimental and inductive research; that it 
is not a latent invisible writing, to be brought out by the magic 
of mental anticipation or metaphysical meditation. Or, as 



132 



PHILOSOPHICAL DLSCUSSLONS. 



Bacon said, it is hot by the "anticipations of the mind," but 
by the "interpretation of nature," that natural philosophy is 
to be constituted; and this is to presume that the order of na- 
ture is decipherable, or that causation is everywhere either 
manifest or hidden, but never absent. 

Mr. Mivart does not wholly reject the process of Natural 
Selection, or disallow it as a real cause in nature, but he re- 
duces it to "a subordinate role" in his view of the derivation 
of species. It serves to perfect the imperfect adaptations, and 
to meet within certain limits unfavorable changes in the condi- 
tions of existence. The "accidents" which Natural Selection 
acts upon are allowed to serve in a subordinate capacity and 
in subjection to a foreordained, particular, divine order, or to 
act like other agencies dependent on an evil principle, which 
are compelled to turn evil into good. Indeed, the only differ- 
ence on purely scientific grounds, and irrespective of theological 
considerations, between Mr. Mivart's views and Mr. Darwin's 
is. in regard to the extent to which the process of Natural Selec- 
tion has been effective in the modifications of species. Mr. 
Darwin himself, from the very nature of the process, has never 
supposed for it, as a cause, any other than a co-ordinate place 
among other causes of change, though he attributes to it a su- 
perintendent, directive, and controlling agency among them. 
The student of the theory would gather quite a different im- 
pression of the theory from Mr. Mivart's account of it, which 
attributes to "Darwinians" the absurd conception of this cause 
as acting "alone" to produce the changes and stabilities of 
species ; whereas, from the very nature of the process, other 
causes of change, whether of a known or as yet unknown nat- 
ure, are presupposed by it. Even Mr. Galton's hypothet- 
ical "facets," or internal conditions of abrupt changes and 
successions of stable equilibriums, might be among these 
causes, if there were any good inductive grounds for sup- 
posing their existence. Reversional and correlated variations 
are, indeed, due to such internal conditions and to laws 
of inheritance, which have been ascertained inductively as at 
least laws of phenomena, but of which the causes, or the ante- 
cedent conditions in the organism, are unknown. Mr Dar- 



• THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. I33 

win continually refers to variations as arising from unknown 
causes, but these are always such, so far as observation can 
determine their relations to the organism's conditions of exist- 
ence, that they are far from accounting for, or bearing any re- 
lations to, the adaptive characters of the organism. It is 
solely upon and with reference to such adaptive characters that 
the process of Natural Selection has any agency, or could be 
supposed to be effective. If Mr. Mivart had cited anywhere 
in his book, as he has not, even a single instance of sudden 
variation in a whole race, either in a state of nature or under 
domestication, which is not referable by known physiological 
laws to the past history of the race on the theory of evolution, 
and had further shown that such a variation was an adaptive 
one, he might have weakened the arguments for the agency 
and extent of the process of Natural Selection. As it is, he has 
left them quite intact. 

The only direct proofs which he adduces for his theory that 
adaptive as well as other combinations proceed from innate 
predeterminations wholly within the organism, are drawn from, 
or rather assumed in, a supposed analogy of the specific forms 
in organisms to those of crystals. As under different circum- 
stances or in different media the same chemical substances or 
constituent substances assume different and distinct crystalline 
forms, so, he supposes, organisms are distinct manifestations 
of typical forms, one after another of which will appear under 
various external conditions. He quotes from Mr. J. J. Mur- 
phy's "Habit and Intelligence," that, "it needs no proof that 
in the case of spheres and crystals, the forms and structures are 
the effect and not the cause of the formative principle. At- 
traction, whether gravitative or capillary, produces the spher- 
ical form ; the spherical form does not produce attraction. And. 
crystalline polarities produce crystalline structure and form ; 
crystalline structure and form do not produce polarities." 
And, by analogy, Mr. Murphy and our author infer that innate 
vital forces always produce specific vital forms, and that the 
vital forms themselves, or " accidental " variations of them, 
cannot modify the types of action in vital force. Now, al- 
though Mr. Murphy's propositions may need no proof, they 



I34 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

will bear correction ; and, clear as they appear to be, a better 
interpretation of the physical facts is needed for the purposes 
of tracing out analogy and avoiding paralogism. Strange as it 
may seem, Mr. Murphy's clear antitheses are not even partially 
true. No abstraction ever produced any other abstraction, 
much less a concrete thing. The abstract laws of attraction 
never produced any body, spherical or polyhedral. It was 
actual forces acting in definite ways that made the sphere or 
crystal ; and the sizes, particular shapes, and positions of these 
bodies determined in part the action of these actual forces. It 
is the resultants of many actual attractions, dependent in turn 
on the actual products, that determine the spherical or crystal- 
line forms. Moreover, in the case of crystals, neither these 
forces nor the abstract law of their action in producing definite 
angles reside in the finished bodies, but in the properties of 
the surrounding media, portions of whose constituents are 
changed into crystals, according to these properties and to 
other conditioning circumstances. So far as these bodies have 
any innate principle in them concerned in their own produc- 
tion, it is manifested in determining, not their general agree- 
ments, but their particular differences in sizes, shapes, and 
positions. The particular position of a crystal that grows from 
some fixed base or nucleus, and the particular directions of its 
faces, may, perhaps, be said to be innate ; that is, they were 
determined at the beginning of the particular crystal's growth. 
Finding, therefore, what Mr. Murphy and Mr. Mivart suppose 
to be innate to be really in the outward conditions of the crys- 
tal's growth, and what they would suppose to be superinduced 
to be all that is innate in it, we have really found the contrast 
in place of an analogy between a crystal and an organism. 
For, in organisms, no doubt, and as we may be readily con- 
vinced without resort to analogy, there is a great deal that is 
really innate, or dependent on actions in the organism, which 
diversities of external conditions modify very little, or affect at 
least in a very indeterminate manner, so far as observation has 
yet ascertained. External conditions are, nevertheless, essen- 
tial factors in development, as well as in mere increase or 
growth. No animal or plant is developed, nor do its develop- 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 



135 



ments acquire any growth without very special external condi- 
tions. These are quite as essential to the production of an 
organism as a crystalline nucleus and fluid material are to the 
growth and particular form of a crystal ; and as the general 
resemblances of the crystals of any species, the agreements in 
their angles, are results of the physical properties of their food 
and other surrounding conditions of their growth, so the gen- 
eral resemblances of animals or plants of any species, their 
agreements in specific characters, are doubtless due, in the 
main, to the properties of what is innate in them, yet not to 
any abstraction. This is sufficiently conspicuous to "need 
no proof," and is denied by no Darwinian. The analogy is 
so close indeed between the internal determinations of growth in 
an organism and the external ones of crystals, that Mr. Darwin 
was led by it to invent his "provisional hypothesis of Pangen- 
esis," or theory of gemmular reproduction. The gemmules in 
this theory being the perfect analogues of the hypothetical 
atoms of the chemical substances that are supposed to arrange 
themselves in crystalline forms, the theory rather gives prob- 
ability to the chemical theory of atoms than borrows any from 
it. But we shall recur to this theory of Pangenesis further on. 
General physiology, or physical and theoretical biology, are 
sciences in which, through the study of the laws of inheritance, 
and the direct and indirect effect of external conditions, we 
must arrive, if in any way, at a more and more definite knowl- 
edge of the causes of specific manifestations ; and this is the end 
to which Mr. Darwin's labors have been directed, and have par- 
tially accomplished. Every step he has taken has been in strict 
conformity to the principles of method which the examples of 
inductive and experimental science have established. A stricter 
observance of these by Mr. Murphy and our author might have 
saved them from the mistake we have noticed, and from many 
others,— the "realism" of ascribing efficacy to an abstraction, 
making attraction and polarity produce structures and forms 
independently of the products and of the concrete matters and 
forces in them. A similar "realism" vitiates nearly all specu- 
lations in theoretical biology, which are not designedly, or even 
instinctively, as in Mr. Darwin's work, made to conform to the 



136 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



rigorous rules of experimental philosophy. These require us 
to assume no causes that are not true or phenomenally known, 
and known in some other way than in the effect to be explained; 
and to prove the sufficiency of those we do assume in some 
other way than by putting an abstract name or description of 
an effect for its cause, like using the words "attraction" and 
"polarity" to account for things the matters of which have 
come together in a definite form. It may seem strange to many 
readers to be told that Mr. Darwin, the most consummate 
speculative genius of our times, is no more a maker of hypoth- 
eses than Newton was, who, unable to discover the cause of 
the properties of gravitation, wrote the often-quoted but much 
misunderstood words, " Hypotheses non Jingo." "For," he 
adds, "whatever is not deduced from the phenomena is to be 
called an hypothesis; and hypotheses, whether metaphysical 
or physical, whether of occult qualities or mechanical, have no 
place in experimental philosophy. In this philosophy particular 
propositions are inferred from the phenomena, and afterwards 
rendered general by induction. Thus it was that the impen- 
etrability, the mobility, and the impulsive force of bodies, and 
the laws of motion and gravitation, were discovered. And to 
us it is enough that gravity does really exist and act according 
to the laws which we have explained, and abundantly serves to 
account for all the motions of the celestial bodies and of our 
sea." Thus, also, it is that the variability of organisms and 
the known laws of variation and inheritance, and of the influ- 
ences of external conditions, and the law of Natural Selection, 
have been discovered. And though it is not enough that vari- 
ability and selection do really exist and act according to laws 
which Mr. Darwin has explained (since the limits of their action 
and efficiency are still to be ascertained), yet it is enough for 
the present that Darwinians do not rest, like their opponents, 
contented with framing what Newton would have called, if he 
had lived after Kant, "transcendental hypotheses" which have 
no place in experimental philosophy. It may be said that Mr. 
Darwin has invented the hypothesis of Pangenesis, against the 
rules of this philosophy; but so also did Newton invent the 
corpuscular theory of light, with a similar purpose and utility. 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 



137 



In determining the limits of the action of Natural Selection, 
and its sufficiency within these limits, the same demonstrative 
adequacy should not, for obvious reasons, be demanded as con- 
ditions of assenting to its highly probable truth, that Newton 
proved for his speculation. For the facts for this investigation 
are hopelessly wanting. Astronomy presents the anomaly, 
among the physical sciences, of being the only science that 
deals in the concrete with a few naturally isolated causes, 
which are separated from all other lines of causation in a way 
that in other physical sciences can only be imitated in the care- 
fully guarded experiments of physical and chemical laboratories. 
The study of animals and plants under domestication is, in- 
deed, a similar mode of isolating with a view to ascertaining 
the physical laws of life by inductive investigations. But the 
theory of Natural Selection, in its actual application to the 
phenomena of life and the origin of species, should not be 
compared to the theory of gravitation in astronomy, nor to the 
principles of physical science as they appear in the natures 
that are shut in by the experimental resources of the labora- 
tory, but rather to these principles as they are actually work- 
ing, and have been working, in the concrete courses of 
outward nature, in meteorology and physical geology. Still 
better, perhaps, at least for the purposes of illustration, we may 
compare the principle of Natural Selection to the fundamental 
laws of political economy, demonstrated and actually at work 
in the production of the values and the prices in the market 
of the wealth which human needs and efforts demand and 
supply. Who can tell from these principles what the market 
will be next week, or account for its prices of last week, even 
by the most ingenious use of hypotheses to supply the missing 
evidence ? The empirical economist and statistician imagines 
that he can discover some other principles at work, some pre- 
determined regularity in the market, some ''innate" principles 
in it, to which the general laws of political economy are subor- 
dinated ; and speculating on them, might risk his own wealth 
in trade, as the speculative "vitalist" might, if anything could 
be staked on a transcendental hypothesis. In the same way 
the empirical weather-philosopher thinks he can discern regu- 



138 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

larities in the weather, which the known principles of mechan- 
ical and chemical physics will not account for, and to which 
they are subordinate. This arises chiefly from his want of 
imagination, of a clear mental grasp of these principles, and 
of an adequate knowledge of the resources of legitimate 
hypothesis to supply the place of the unknown incidental 
causes through which these principles act. Such are also the 
sources of most of the difficulties which Mr. Mivart has found 
in the application of the theory of Natural Selection. 

His work is chiefly taken up with these difficulties. He does 
not so much insist on the probability of his own transcendental 
hypothesis, as endeavor to make way for it by discrediting 
the sufficiency of its rival; as if this could serve his purpose; 
as if experimental philosophy itself, without aid from " Darwin- 
ism," would not reject his metaphysical, occult, transcendental 
hypothesis of a specially predetermined and absolute fixity of 
species, — an hypothesis which multiplies species in an organ- 
ism to meet emergencies, — the emergencies of theory, — much 
as the epicycles of Ptolemy had to be multiplied in the heav- 
ens. Ptolemy himself had the sagacity to believe that his was 
only a mathematical theory, a mode of representation, not a 
theory of causation ; and to prize it only as representative of 
the facts of observation, or as "saving the appearances/' Mr. 
Mivart's theory, on the other hand, is put forward as a theory 
of causation, not to save appearances, but to justify the hasty 
conclusion that they are real; the appearances, namely, of 
complete temporary fixity, alternating with abrupt changes, in 
the forms of life which are exhibited by the scanty records of 
geology and in present apparently unchanging natural species. 

Before proceeding to a special consideration of Mr. Mivart's 
difficulties on the theory of Natural Selection, we will quote 
from Mr. Darwin's latest work, "The Descent of Man," his 
latest views of the extent of the action of this principle and 
its relations to the general theory of evolution. He says 
(Chapter IV): 

"Thus a very large yet undefined extension may safely be given to the 
direct and indirect results of Natural Selection ; but I now admit, after 
reading the essay by Nageli on plants, and the remarks by various authors 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 139 

with respect to animals, more especially those recently made by Professor 
Broca, that in the earlier editions of my 'Origin of Species' I probably 
attributed too much to the action of Natural Selection, or the survival of 
the fittest. I have altered the fifth edition of the 'Origin' [the edition 
which Mr. Mivart reviews in his work] so as to confine my remarks to 
adaptive changes of structure. I had not formerly sufficiently considered 
the existence of many structures which appear to be, as far as we can 
judge, neither beneficial nor injurious; and this I believe to be one of the 
greatest oversights as yet detected in my work. I may be permitted to 
say, as some excuse, that I had two distinct objects in view: firstly, to 
show that species had not been separately created; and secondly, that 
Natural Selection had been the chief agent of change, though largely 
aided by the inherited effects of habit, and slightly by the direct action of 
the surrounding conditions. Nevertheless, I was not able to annul the 
influence of my former belief, then widely prevalent, that each species 
had been purposely created; and this led to my tacitly assuming that 
every detail of structure, excepting rudiments, was of some special, 
though unrecognized, service. Any one with this assumption in his mind 
would naturally extend the action of Natural Selection, either during past 
or present times, too far. Some of those who admit the principle of 
evolution, but reject Natural Selection, seem to forget, when criticising 
my work, that I had the above two objects in view; hence, if I have 
erred in giving to Natural Selection great power, which I am far from 
admitting, or in having exaggerated its power, which is in itself probable, 
I have at least, as I hope, done good service in aiding to overthrow the 
dogma of separate creations." 

In one other respect Mr. Darwin has modified his views of 
the action of Natural Selection, in consequence of a valuable 
criticism in the North British Review of June, 1&67 ; and Mr. 
Mivart regards this modification as very important, and says 
of it that "this admission seems almost to amount to a change 
of front in the face of the enemy." It is not, as we shall see, 
an important modification at all, and does not change in any 
essential particular the theory as propounded in the first edi- 
tion of the " Origin of Species," but Mr. Mivart's opinion of it 
has helped us to discover what, without this confirmation, 
seemed almost incredible, — how completely he has misappre- 
hended, not merely the use of the theory in special applica- 
tions, which is easily excusable, but also the nature of its gen- 
eral operation and of the causes employed by it; thus furnishing 
an additional illustration of what he says in his Introduction, 
that " few things are more remarkable than the way in which 



1 4 o PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

it [this theory] has been misunderstood." One other consid- 
eration has also been of aid to us. In his concluding chapter 
on "Theology and Evolution," in which he very ably shows, 
and on the most venerable authority, that there is no necessary 
conflict between the strictest orthodoxy and the theory of evo- 
lution, he remarks (and quotes Dr. Newman) on the narrowing 
effect of single lines of study. Not only inabilities may be 
produced by a one-sided pursuit, but "a positive distaste may 
grow up, which, in the intellectual order, may amount to a 
spontaneous and unreasoning disbelief in that which appears to 
be in opposition to the more familiar concept, and this at all 
times." This is, of course, meant to apply to those who, 
from want of knowledge, lack interest in and even acquire 
a distaste for theological studies. But it also has other and 
equally important applications. Mr. Mivart, it would at first 
sight seem, being distinguished as a naturalist and also versed 
in theology, is not trammeled by any such narrowness as 
to disable him from giving just weight to both sides of the 
question he discusses. But what are the two sides ? Are 
they the view of the theologian and the naturalist ? Not at 
all. The debate is between the theologian and descriptive 
naturalist on one side, or the theologian and the student of 
natural history in its narrowest sense, that is, systematic biol- 
ogy; and on the other side the physical naturalist, physiolo- 
gist, or theoretical biologist. Natural history and biology, or 
the general science of life, are very comprehensive terms, and 
comprise in their scope widely different lines of pursuit and a 
wide range of abilities. In fact, the sciences of biology contain 
contrasts in the objects, abilities, and interests of scientific 
pursuit almost as wide as that presented by the physical sci- 
ences generally, and the sciences of direct observation, descrip- 
tion, and classification. The same contrast holds, indeed, even 
in a science so limited in its material objects as astronomy. 
The genius of the practical astronomer and observer is very 
different from that of the physical astronomer and mathema- 
tician; though success in this science generally requires now- 
adays that some degree of both should be combined. So the 
genius of the physiologist is different from that of the naturalist 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 



T 4 I 



4 



proper, though in the study of comparative anatomy the ob- 
server has to exercise some of the skill in analysis and in the 
use of hypotheses in which the student of the physical sciences 
displays his genius in the search for unknown causes. We may, 
perhaps, comprise all the forms of intellectual genius (exclud- 
ing aesthetics) under three chief classes, namely, first, the genius 
that pursues successfully the researches for unknown causes by 
the skillful use of hypothesis and experiment; secondly, that 
which, avoiding the use of hypotheses or preconceptions alto- 
gether and the delusive influence of names, brings together 
in clear connections and contrasts in classification the objects 
of nature in their broadest and most real relations of resem- 
blance; and thirdly, that genius which seeks with success for 
reasons and authorities in support of cherished convictions. 

That Mr. Mivart may have the last two forms of genius, even 
in a notable degree, we readily admit; but that he has not the 
first to the degree needed for an inquiry, which is essentially a 
branch of physical science, we propose to show. We have 
already pointed out how his theological education, his school- 
ing against Democritus, has misled him in regard to the mean- 
ing of "accidents" or accidental causes in physical science; 
as if to the physical philosopher these could possibly be an 
absolute and distinct class, not included under the law of cau- 
sation, "that every event must have a cause or determinate 
antecedents," whether we can trace them out or not. The 
accidental causes of science are only "accidents" relatively to 
the intelligence of a man. Eclipses have the least of this 
character to the astronomer of all the phenomena of nature; 
yet to the savage they are the most terrible of monstrous acci- 
dents. The accidents of monstrous variation, or even of the 
small and limited variations normal in any race or species, are 
only accidents relatively to the intelligence of the naturalist, or 
to his knowledge of general physiology. An accident is what 
cannot be anticipated from what we know, or by any intelli- 
gence, perhaps, which is less than omniscient. 

But this is not the most serious misconception of the acci- 
dental causes of science, which Mr. Mivart has fallen into. He 
utterly mistakes the particular class of accidents concerned in 



142 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



the process of Natural Selection. To make this clear, we will 
enumerate the classes of causes which are involved in this proc- 
ess. In the first place, there are the external conditions of 
an animal's or plant's life, comprising chiefly its relations to 
other organic beings, but partly its relations to inorganic na- 
ture, and determining its needs and some of the means of 
satisfying them. These conditions are consequences of the 
external courses of events or of the partial histories of organic 
and inorganic nature. In the second place, there are the 
general principles of the fitness of means to ends, or of sup- 
plies to needs. These comprise the best ascertained and most 
fundamental of all the principles of science, such as the laws 
of mechanical, optical, and acoustical science, by which we 
know how a leg, arm, or wing, a bony frame, a muscular or a 
vascular system, an eye or an ear, can be of use. In the third 
place, there are the causes introduced by Mr. Darwin to the 
attention of physiologists, as normal facts of organic nature, 
the little known phenomena of variation, and their relations to 
the laws of inheritance. There are several classes of these. 
The most important in the theory of Natural Selection are the 
diversities always existing in any race of animals or plants, 
called "individual differences," which always determine a bet- 
ter fitness of some individuals to the general conditions of the 
existence of a race than other less fortunate individuals possess. 
The more than specific agreements in characters, which the 
best fitted individuals of a race must thus exhibit, ought, if 
possible, according to Cuvier's principles of zoology, to be 
included in the description of a species (as a norm or type 
which only the best exhibit), instead of the rough averages to 
which the naturalist really resorts in defining species by marks 
or characters that are variable. But probably such averages 
in variable characters are really close approximations to the 
characters of the best general adaptation ; for variation being, 
so far as known, irrespective of adaptation, is as likely to exist 
to the same extent on one side of the norm of utility as on the 
other, or by excess as generally as by defect. Though varia- 
tion is irrespective of utility, its limits are not. Too great a 
departure from the norm of utility must put an end to life anil 






THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 143 

its successions. Utility therefore, in conjunction with the laws 
of inheritance, determines not only the middle line or safest 
way of a race, but also the bounding limits of its path of life ; 
and so long as the conditions and principles of utility embodied 
in a form of life remain unchanged, they will, together with the 
laws of inheritance, maintain a race unchanged in its average 
characters. 

"Specific stability," therefore, for which theological and 
descriptive naturalists have speculated a transcendental cause, 
is even more readily and directly accounted for by the 
causes which the theory of Natural Selection regards than is 
specific change. But just as obviously it follows from these 
causes that a change in the conditions and resources of utility, 
not only may but must change the normal characters of a 
species, or else the race must perish. Again, a slow and grad- 
ual change in the conditions of existence must, on these 
principles, slowly change the middle line or safest way of life 
(the descriptive or graphic line) ; but always, of course, this 
change must be within the existing limits of variation, or the 
range of "individual differences." A change in these limits 
would then follow, or the range of "individual differences" 
would be extended, at least, so far as we know, in the direc- 
tion of the change. That it is widened or extended to a greater 
range by rapid and important changes in conditions of exist- 
ence, is a matter of observation in many races of animals and 
plants that have been long subject to domestication or to the 
capricious conditions imposed by human choice and care. This 
phenomenon is like what would happen if a roadway or path 
across a field were to become muddy or otherwise obstructed. 
The traveled way would swerve to one side, or be broadened, 
or abandoned, according to the nature and degree of the ob- 
struction, and to the resources of travel that remained. This 
class of variations, that is, " individual differences," constant 
and normal in a race, but having different ranges in different 
races, or in the same race under different circumstances, may 
be regarded as in no proper sense accidentally related to the 
advantages that come from them ; or in no other sense than a 
tendril, or a tentacle, or a hand searching in the dark, is acci- 



1 4 4 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

dentally related to the object it succeeds in finding. And yet 
we say properly that it was by "accident" that a certain ten- 
dril was put forth so as to fulfill its function, and clasp the par- 
ticular object by which it supports the vine; or that it was an 
accidental movement of the tentacle or hand that brought the 
object it has secured within its grasp. The search was, and 
continues to be, normal and general ; it is the particular suc- 
cess only that is accidental ; and this only in the sense that 
lines of causation, stretching backwards infinitely, and unre- ^ 
lated except in a first cause, or in the total order of nature, 
come together and by their concurrence produce it. Yet over 
even this concurrence " law " still presides, to the effect that for 
every such concurrence the same consequences follow. 

But Mr. Mivart, with his mind filled with horror of "blind 
chance," and of " the fortuitous concourse of atoms," has en- 
tirely overlooked the class of accidental variations, on which, 
even in the earlier editions of the " Origin of Species," the theory 
of Natural Selection is based, and has fixed his attention exclu- 
sively on another class, namely, abnormal or unusual variations, 
which Mr. Darwin at first supposed might also be of service in 
this process. The error of his critic might, perhaps, be re- 
garded as due to Mr. Darwin's failure to distinguish suffi- 
ciently the two classes, as well as to his overlooking, until 
it was pointed out in the article in the "North British 
Review," before referred to, the fact that the latter class 
could be of no service; if it were not that Mr. Mivart's 
work is a review of the last edition of the " Origin of Species " 
and of the treatise on "Animals and Plants under Domesti- 
cation," in both of which Mr. Darwin has emphatically dis- 
tinguished the two classes, and admitted that it is upon the 
first class only that Natural Selection can normally depend ; 
though the second class of unusual and monstrous variations 
may give rise, by highly improbable though possible accidents, 
to changes in the characters of whole races. Mr. Mivart char- 
acterizes this admission by the words we have quoted, that "it 
seems almost to amount to a change of front in the face of the 
enemy"; of which it might have been enough to say, that the 
strategy of science is not the same as that of rhetorical dispu- 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 



145 



tation, and aims at cornering facts, not antagonists But Mr. 
Mivart profits by it as a scholastic triumph over he :esy, which 
he insists upon celebrating, rather than as a correction of his 
own misconceptions of the theory. He continues throughout 
his book to speak of the variations on which Natural Selection 
depends as if they were all of rare occurrence, like abrupt and 
monstrous variations, instead of being always present in a race ; 
and also as having the additional disadvantage of being "in- 
dividually slight," "minute," "insensible," "infinitesimal," 
"fortuitous," and "indefinite." These epithets are variously 
combined in different passages, but his favorite compendious 
formula is, "minute, fortuitous, and indefinite variations." 
When, however, he comes to consider the enormous time 
which such a process must have taken to produce the present 
forms of life, he brings to bear all his forces, and says (p. 154) : 
"It is not easy to believe that less than two thousand million 
years would be required for the totality of animal development 
by no other means than minute, fortuitous, occasional, and in- 
termitting variations in all conceivable directions." This ex- 
ceeds very much — by some two hundred-fold — the length of 
time Sir William Thomson allows for the continuance of life 
on the earth. It is difficult to see how, with such uncertain 
"fortuitous, occasional, and intermitting" elements, our author 
could have succeeded in making any calculations at all. On 
the probability of the correctness of Sir William Thomson's 
physical arguments "the author of this book cannot presume 
to advance an opinion; but," he adds (p. 150), "the fact that 
they have not been refuted pleads strongly in their favor when 
we consider how much they tell against the theory of Mr. 
Darwin." He can, it appears, judge of them on his own side. 
For the descriptive epithets which Mr. Mivart applies to the 
variations on which he supposes Natural Selection to depend 
he has the following authority. He says (p. 35) : " N dw it is 
distinctly enunciated by Mr. Darwin that the spontaneous vari- 
ations upon which his theory depends are individually slight, 
minute, and insensible. He says (Animals and Plants imder 
Domestication, Vol. II, p. 192): 'Slight individual differences, 
however, suffice for the work, and are probably the sole difler- 
7 



146 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

ences which are effective in the production of new species.' " 
After what we have said as to the real nature of the differences 
from which nature selects, it might be, perhaps, unnecessary 
to explain what ought at least to have been known to a natu- 
ralist, that by "individual differences" is meant the differences 
between the individuals of a race of animals or plants ; that 
the slightness of them is only relative to the differences between 
the characters of species, and that they may be very consider- 
able in themselves, or their effects, or even to the eye of the 
naturalist. How the expression "slight individual differences" 
could have got translated in the writer's mind into "individu- 
ally slight, minute, and insensible" ones, has no natural expla- 
nation. But this is not the only instance of such an unfathom- 
able translation in Mr. Mivart's treatment of the theory of 
Natural Selection. Two others occur on page 133. In the 
first he says : " Mr. Darwin abundantly demonstrates the vari- 
ability of dogs, horses, fowls, and pigeons, but he none the less 
shows the very small extent to which the goose, the peacock, 
and the guinea-fowl have varied. Mr. Darwin attempts to 
explain this fact as regards the goose by the animal being 
valued only for food and feathers, and from no pleasure having 
been felt in it on other accounts. He adds, however, at the 
erid, the striking remark, which concedes the whole position, 
' but the goose seems to have a singularly inflexible organiza- 
tion.' 1 " The translation is begun in the author's italics, and 
completed a few pages further on (p. 141), where, recurring 
to this subject, he says : "We have seen that Mr. Darwin him- 
self implicitly admits the principle of specific stability in assert- 
ing the singular inflexibility of the organization of the goose." 
This is what is called in scholastic logic, Fallacia a dicto 
secundum quid ad dictum simpliciter. The obvious meaning, 
both from the contexts and the evidence, of the expression, 
"singularly inflexible," is that the goose has been much less 
changed by domestication than other domestic birds. But this 
relative inflexibility is understood by Mr. Mivart as an admission 
of an absolute one, in spite of the evidence that geese have va- 
ried from the wild type, and have individual differences, and 
even differences of breeds, which are sufficiently conspicuous, 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 



147 



even tc the eye of a goose. The next instance of Mr. Mivart's 
translations (p. 133) is still more remarkable. He continues: 
" This is not the only place in which such expressions are 
used. He [Mr. Darwin] elsewhere makes use of phrases which 
quite harmonize with the conception of a normal specific con- 
stancy, but varying greatly and suddenly at intervals. Thus 
he speaks of a whole organism seeming to have become plastic 
and tending to depart from the parental type (' Origin of Spe- 
cies,' 5th edit., 1869, p. 13)." The italics are Mr. Mivart's. 
The passage from which these words are quoted (though they 
are not put in quotation-marks) is this : " It is well worth while 
carefully to study the several treatises on some of our old cul- 
tivated plants, as on the hyacinth, potato, even the dahlia, etc. ; 
and it is really surprising to note the endless points in structure 
and constitution in w T hich the varieties and sub-varieties differ 
slightly from each other. The whole organization seems to 
have become plastic, and tends to depart in a slight degree from 
that of the parental type." The words that we have italicized 
in this quotation are omitted by Mr. Mivart, though essential to 
the point on which he cites Mr. Darwin's authority, namely, 
as to the organism "varying greatly and suddenly at intervals." 
Logic has no adequate name for this fallacy ; but there is an- 
other in Mr. Mivart's understanding of the passage which is 
very familiar, — the fallacy of ambiguous terms. Mr. Darwin 
obviously uses the word " plastic " in its secondary signification 
as the name of that which is "capable of being moulded, mod- 
eled, or fashioned to the purpose, as clay." His critic quite 
as obviously understands it in its primary signification as 
the name of anything "having the power to give form." But 
this is a natural enough misunderstanding, since in scholastic 
philosophy the primary signification of "plastic" is the prevail- 
ing one. 

Such being Mr. Mivart's misconceptions of the principle of 
Natural Selection, and such their source, it would be useless to 
follow him in his tests of it by hypothetical illustrations from 
the history of animals; but we are bound to make good our 
assertion that his difficulties have arisen, not only from his 
want of a clear mental grasp of principles, but also from 



1 4 8 PHIL OSOPHICA L DISC US S IONS. 

an inadequate knowledge of the resources of legitimate hy- 
pothesis to supply the unknown incidental causes through 
which the principle has acted. These deficiencies of knowledge 
and imagination, though more excusable, are not less conspic- 
uous in his criticisms than the defects we have noticed. He 
says (p. 59): "It may be objected, perhaps, that these diffi- 
culties are difficulties of ignorance ; that we cannot explain 
them, because we do not know enough of the animals." It 
is not surprising that he adds: "But it is here contended 
that this is not the case; it is not that we merely fail to 
see how Natural Selection acted, but that there is a positive 
incompatibility between the cause assigned and the results." 
And no wonder that he remarks at the close of the chapter 
(Chapter II): "That minute, fortuitous, and indefinite varia- 
tions could have brought about such special forms and mod- 
ifications as have been enumerated in this chapter seems to 
contradict, not imagination, but reason." 

In this chapter on " Incipient Structures," two facts are quite 
overlooked, — the one, which is so conspicuous in the principles 
of comparative anatomy, how few the fundamental structures 
are, which have been turned to such numerous uses; that is, 
how meagre have been the resources of Natural Selection, 
so far as it has depended on the occurrence of structures 
which were of no previous use, or were not already partially 
useful in directions in which they have been modified by 
the selection and inheritance of "individual differences"; 
the other, how important to Natural Selection have been 
the principles of indirect utility and "correlated acquisi- 
tion," dependent as they are on ultimate physical laws. 
The human hand is still useful in swimming, and the fishes' 
fins could even be used for holding or clasping, if there were 
occasion for it. We might well attribute the paucity of indif- 
ferent types of structure to the agency of the rarest accidents 
of nature, though not in a theological sense. Animals and 
plants are no longer dependent for improvement on their 
occurrence, and, perhaps, never were after their competition 
and struggle for existence had fully begun. It is so much easier 
for them to turn to better account powers that they already 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 149 

possess in small degrees. Previously to such a competition 
and struggle, when the whole field of the inorganic condi- 
tions of life was open to simple organisms, they were doubtless 
much more variable than afterwards. But variability would 
then have been, as it is now, in no absolute sense accidental. 
On the contrary, variation, instead of comparative stability in 
species, would have been the most prominent normal feature 
of life. The tentative powers of life, trying all things, but not 
holding fast to that which is good, or not so firmly as after- 
wards, instead of its hereditary features, would have been its 
most characteristic manifestation. Our author's general diffi- 
culty in this chapter is as to how variations too small to have 
been of use could have been preserved, and he is correct in 
thinking that it could not be by Natural Selection, or the sur- 
vival of the fittest, but wrong in thinking that variations 
are generally so rare or so insignificant, even in present 
forms of life as to require a power other than those of life 
in general to bring them forth when needed, or to produce 
them in useful amounts. 

The first example of the working of Natural Selection is the 
well-known case of the neck of the giraffe. This, it has been 
imagined, though not by Mr. Darwin, was produced by its 
supposed use in aiding this animal to feed on the foliage of 
trees, and by the occasional advantage of length of neck to 
the highest reaching individuals, when in drought and scarcity 
the ground vegetation and lower foliage were consumed 
enabling them to survive the others and in continuing the 
species, to transmit this advantage to their offspring. With- 
out denying that this is an excellent hypothetical illustra- 
tion of the process of Natural Selection, Mr. Mivart attacks 
its probability as a matter of fact. In reply to it he says : 
" But against this it may be said, in the first place, that the 
argument proves too much; for, on this supposition, many 
species must have tended to undergo a similar modification 
and we ought to have at least several forms similar to the 
giraffe developed from different Ungulata" or hoofed beasts. 
We would even go further than Mr. Mivart, and hold that, 
on the hypothesis in question, not only several forms, but 



i5° 



PHIL OSOPHICA L DISC US S IONS. 



the whole order of Ungulata, or large portions of it, should 
have been similarly modified; at least those inhabiting re- 
gions subject to droughts and presenting the alternative of 
grazing on the ground and browsing on the foliage of high 
trees. But as these alternatives do not universally exist in 
regions inhabited by such animals, very long necks would not, 
perhaps, if this hypothesis were true, characterize the whole 
order; as the habit of herding does, for example. We may ob- 
serve, however, that this illustration from the giraffe's neck is 
not an argument at all, and proves nothing, though the hy- 
pothesis employed by it is very well called in question by Mr. 
Mivart's criticism. But can Mr. Mivart suppose that, having 
fairly called in question the importance of the high-feeding use 
of the giraffe's neck, he has thereby destroyed the utility of the 
neck altogether, not only to the theory of Natural Selection, 
but also to the animal itself? Is there, then, no important use 
in the giraffe's neck? Is it really the monstrosity it appears to 
be, when seen out of relation to the normal conditions of the 
animal's life ? But if there be any utility left in the neck, as a 
teleologist or a believer in Final Causes would assume without 
question, and in spite of this criticism, then this other utility 
might serve the purposes of Natural Selection even better 
perhaps than that of the mistaken hypothesis. If Mr. Mi- 
vart had approached this subject in the proper spirit, his 
criticism would probably have led him to an important ob- 
servation, which his desire to discredit a much more im- 
portant discovery has hidden from his view. He would 
have inquired what are the conditions of existence of the 
Ungulates generally and of the giraffe in particular, which 
are so close pressing and so emphatically attest the grounds 
of their severest struggle for life, as to be likely to cause 
in them the highest degree of specialty and adaptation. 
The question of food is obviously not concerned in such a 
struggle, for this order of animals lives generally upon food 
which is the most abundant and most easily obtained. Mr. 
Mivart compares his objection to one that has been made 
against Mr. Wallace's views as to the uses of color in animals, 
that "color being dangerous, should not exist in nature,' or 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 



ISI 



that " a dull color being needful, all animals should be so col- 
ored." He quotes Mr. Wallace's reply, but does not take the 
clue to the solution of his difficulty respecting the giraffe's neck, 
which it almost forces on him. This reply was, that many an- 
imals can afford brilliant colors, and their various direct uses 
or values, when the animals are otherwise provided with suffi- 
cient protection, and that brilliant colors are even sometimes 
indirectly protective. The quills of the porcupine, the shells of 
tortoises and mussels, the very hard coats of certain beetles, the 
stings of certain other insects, the nauseous taste of brilliantly 
colored caterpillars, and other instances, are given as examples 
of protection with color. Now, what bearing has this on the 
long neck of the giraffe? According to Mr. Mivart, who is 
himself at this point on the defensive, it is as follows. He says: 
"But because many different kinds of animals can elude the 
observation or defy the attack of enemies in a great variety of 
ways, it by no means follows that there are any similar number 
and variety of ways for attaining vegetable food in a country 
where all such food other than the lofty branches of trees 
has been destroyed. In such a country we have a number 
of vegetable-feeding Ungulates, all of which present minute 
variations as to the length of the neck." Mr. Mivart is appar- 
ently not aware that he is here arguing, not against the theory 
of Natural Selection, but against a subordinate and false hy- 
pothesis under it. But if he thinks thus to undermine the 
theory, it must be because he is not aware of, or has not 
present to his imagination, the numberless ingenuities of nat- 
ure, and the resources of support the theory has to rest upon. 
There can be no doubt that the neck of the giraffe, whatever 
other uses it can be put to, and it is put to several, is pre-emi- 
nently useful as a watch-tower. Its eyes, large and lustrous, 
"which beam with a peculiarly mild but fearless expression, 
are so placed as to take in a wider range of the horizon than is 
subject to the vision of any other quadruped. While browsing 
on its favorite acacia, the giraffe, by means of its laterally pro- 
jecting orbits, can direct its sight so as to anticipate a threat- 
ened attack in the rear from the stealthy lion or any other foe 
of the desert." When attacked, the giraffe can defend itself 



I 5 2 



PHILOSOPHICAL DLSCUSSLONS. 



by powerful blows with its well-armed hoofs, and even its short 
horns can inflict fatal blows by the sidelong swing of its neck. 
But these are not its only protections against danger. Its nos- 
trils can be voluntarily closed, like the camel's, against the 
sandy, suffocating clouds of the desert. "The tail of the giraffe 
looks like an artificially constructed fly-flapper; and it seems 
at first incredible," says Mr. Darwin, "that this could have 
been adapted for its present purpose by successive slight modi- 
fications, each better and better fitted, for so trifling an object 
as to drive away flies ; yet we should pause before being too 
positive, even in this case, for we know that the distribution 
and existence of cattle and other animals in South America 
absolutely depend on their power of resisting the attacks of 
insects; so that individuals which could, by any means, defend 
themselves from these small enemies, would be able to range 
into new pastures, and thus gain a great advantage. It is not 
that the larger quadrupeds are actually destroyed (except in 
rare cases) by flies, but they are incessantly harrassed and their 
strength reduced, so that they are more subject to disease, or 
not so well enabled in a coming dearth to search for food, or 
to escape from beasts of prey." 

This passage recalls our main problem, which does not con- 
cern the giraffe alone, but all the Ungulates; and its solution 
will show that this order of animals exhibits, almost as well as 
Mr. Wallace's examples, the resources that nature has for the 
protection of animals that have the disadvantage, not, indeed, 
generally of brilliant colors, but of exposure by living exclu- 
sively on bulky and comparatively innutritious food. Nearly 
all the resources of defensive warfare are exhausted in their 
specialties of protection. The giraffe alone is provided with a 
natural watch-tower, but the others are not left without defense. 
All, or nearly all, live in armies or herds, and some post senti- 
nels around their herds. The numerous species of the ante- 
lope resort to natural fortifications or fastnesses. "They are 
the natives for the most part of the wildest and least accessible 
places in the warmer latitudes of the globe, frequenting the 
cliffs and ledges of mountain rocks or the verdure-clad banks 
of tropical streams, or the oases of the desert." Other tribes 



THE G EXE SIS OF SPECIES, I53 

depend on their fleetness, and on hiding in woods like the deer. 
Others, again, on great powers of endurance in flight and long 
marches, like the camels with their commissaries of provision. 
Others, again, with powerful frames, like the rhinoceros and 
the bisons, resort to defensive attack. The ruminant habits 
and organs of large numbers are adapted to rapid and danger- 
ous foraging, and to digestion under protection from beasts of 
prey and insects. 

But Mr. Mivart, with little fertility of defense for the theory 
of Natural Selection, is still not without some ingenuity in at- 
tack. He objects, in the second place, that the longest necked 
giraffes, being by so much the larger animals, would not be 
strong in proportion, but would need more food to sustain 
them, a disadvantage which would, perhaps, more than out- 
balance the neck in times of drought ; and he cites Mr. Spen- 
cer's ingenious speculations on the relations of size, food, 
and strength, in confirmation of this objection. But he forgets 
or overlooks the important physiological law of the compensa- 
tion or economy of growth which prevails in variations. A 
longer neck does not necessarily entail a greater bulk or weight 
on the animal as a whole. The neck may have grown at the 
expense of the hind parts in the ancestors of the giraffe. If we 
met with an individual man with a longer neck than usual, we 
should not expect to find him heavier, or relatively weaker, or 
requiring more food on that account. 

But let us pass to the next illustration of the insufficiency 
of Natural Selection. This is the difficulty Mr. Mivart finds 
in attributing to this cause various cases of mimicry or pro- 
tective resemblances of animals to other animals, or to other 
natural objects. In some insects this is carried to a won- 
derful extent. Thus, some which imitate leaves when at 
rest, in the sizes, shapes, colors, and markings of their 
wings, "extend the imitation even to the very injuries on 
those leaves made by the attacks of insects or fungi." Thus 
Mr. Wallace says of the walking-stick insects : " One of 
these creatures, obtained by myself in Borneo, was covered 
over with foliaceous excrescences of a clear olive-green color 
so as exactly to resemble a stick grown over by creeping 



J 54 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



moss or junger'mannia. The Dyak who brought it me assured 
me it was grown over with moss, although alive, and it was 
only after a most minute examination that I could convince 
myself it was not so." And in speaking of the leaf-butterfly, 
he says: "We come to a still more extraordinary part of the 
imitation, for we find representations of leaves in every stage 
of decay, variously blotched and mildewed, and pierced with 
holes, and in many cases irregularly covered with powdery 
black dots, gathered into patches and spots, so closely resem- 
bling the various kinds of minute fungi that grow on dead 
leaves that it is impossible to avoid thinking, at first sight, that 
the butterflies themselves have been attacked by real fungi." 
Upon these passages Mr. Mivart remarks : " Here imitation 
has attained a development which seems utterly beyond the 
power of the mere ' survival of the fittest ' to produce. How 
this double mimicry can importantly aid in the struggle for life 
seems puzzling indeed, but much more so how the first begin- 
nings of the imitation of such injuries in the leaf can be devel- 
oped in the animal into such a complete representation of 
them ; a fortiori, how simultaneous and similar first beginnings 
of imitations of such injuries could ever have been developed 
in several individuals, out of utterly indifferent and indetermi- 
nate infinitesimal variations in all conceivable directions." 

What ought to have been first suggested to a naturalist by 
this wonderful mimicry is, what clever entomologists some 
insectivorous birds must have become to be able to press the 
conditions of existence and the struggle for life in these in- 
sects to such a degree of specialty. But this, after all, is not 
so very wonderful, when we consider what microscopic sight 
these birds must have acquired and what practice and exclusive 
interest in the pursuit ! We may feel pretty confident, how- 
ever, that neither Natural Selection nor any occult or transcend- 
ental cause has ever carried protective mimicry beyond eye- 
sight, though it may well be a better eyesight than that even 
of a skillful naturalist. There is no necessity to suppose, with 
our author, that the variations on which this selection depended 
were either simultaneous, or infinitesimal, or indifferent, for 
"individual differences" are always considerable and generally 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 



^S. 



greatest in directions in which variations have already most 
recently occurred, as in characters in which closely allied races, 
differ most from each other; but, doubtless, a very long time 
was required for these very remarkable cases of mimicry to 
come to pass. The difficulties they present resemble those of 
the development of sight itself, on which Mr. Mivart com- 
ments elsewhere ; but in these particular cases the conditions 
of "hide and seek" in the sport of nature offer correlated 
difficulties, which, like acid and alkali, serve to neutralize each 
other. In these cases, four distinct forms of life of widely 
diverse origins, or very remotely connected near the beginnings 
of life itself, like four main branches of a tree, have come to- 
gether into closest relations, as parts of the foliage of the four 
main branches might do. These are certain insectivorous 
birds, certain higher vegetable forms, the imitated sticks or 
leaves, certain vegetable parasites on them, and the mimicking 
insects. But the main phenomenon was and is the neck-and- 
neck race of variation and the selection between the powers of 
hiding in the insect and the powers of finding in the bird. Mr. 
Mivart overlooks the fact that variations in the bird are quite 
as essential to the process as those of the insect, and has chosen 
to consider elsewhere the difficulties which the developments 
of the eye present, and to consider them in equal independence 
of its obvious uses. The fact that these, as well as other ex- 
traordinary cases of mimicry, are found only in tropical cli- 
mates, or climates equable not only in respect to short periodic 
but also secular changes, accords well with the probable Length 
of time in which this competition has been kept up ; and the 
extraordinary, that is, rare character of the phenomenon agrees 
well with the probable supposition that it has always begun in 
what we call in science "an accident." If its beginnings were 
common, their natural consequences would also be common, 
and would not be wonderful ; and if it arose from a destructive, 
unintelligent, evil principle, — from Ahriman, — it has, at least, 
shown how the course of nature has been able to avoid destruc- 
tion, to the astonishment of human intelligence, and how 
Oromasdes has been able to defeat his antagonist by turning 
evil into good. 



I5 6 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

Let us take next Mr. Mivart's treatment of a supposed origin 
of the mammary, or milk glands : 

"Is it conceivable," he asks (p. 60), "that the young of any animal 
was ever saved from destruction by accidentally sucking a drop of scarcely 
nutritious fluid from an accidentally hypertrophied cutaneous gland of its 
mother ? And even if one was so, what chance was there of the perpet- 
uation of such a variation? On the hypothesis of 'Natural Selection' 
itself we must assume that, up to that time, the race had been well adapt- 
ed to the surrounding conditions; the temporary and accidental trial and 
change of conditions, which caused the so-sucking young one to be the 
'fittest to survive' under the supposed circumstances, would soon cease 
to act, and then the progeny of the mother, with the accidentally hyper- 
trophied sebaceous glands, would have no tendency to survive the far- 
outnumbering descendants of the normal ancestral form." 

Here, as before, Mr. Mivart stakes the fate of the theory on 
the correctness of his own conceptions of the conditions of its 
action. He forgets, first of all, that the use of a milk gland in 
its least specialized form requires at least a sucking mouth, and 
that sucking mouths and probosces have very extensive uses in 
the animal kingdom. They are good for drinking water and 
nectar, and are used for drawing blood as well as milk ; and, 
without reference to alimentation, are, still serviceable for sup- 
port to parasitical animals. Might not the young, which before 
birth are, in a high degree, parasitical in all animals, find it 
highly advantageous to continue the habit after birth, even 
without reference to food, but for the generally quite as impor- 
tant use of protection against enemies, by clinging by a suck- 
ing mouth to the body of its dam ? If this should cause seba- 
ceous glands to become hypertrophied and ultimately a valuable 
or even an exclusive source of nutrition, it would, perhaps, be 
proper to describe the phenomenon as an unintended or acci- 
dental, but not as a rare or improbable one. Moreover, though 
on the theory of Natural Selection (or, indeed, on any theory 
of the continuance of a race by modifications of structures and 
habits), the race must, while it lives, be fitted to live, yet it 
need be no more fitted to do so than to survive in its offspring. 
No race is so well fitted to its general conditions of existence, 
but that some individuals are better fitted than others, and 
have, on the average, an advantage. And new resources do 
not imply abandonment of the old, but only additions to them, 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 157 

giving superiorities that are almost never superfluous. How, 
indeed, but by accidents of the rarest occurrence, could varia- 
tion (much less selection) give superfluous advantages, on the 
whole, or except temporarily and so far as normal variations 
anticipate in general, regular, or usual changes in the condi- 
tions of existence ? We have, to be sure, on the hypothesis we 
have proposed, still to account for the original of the sucking 
mouth, though its numerous uses are obvious enough, on the 
really uniform and unvarying types of natural law, the laws of 
inorganic physics, the principles of suction. But we are not 
ambitious to rival nature in ingenuity, only to contrast its re- 
sources with those of our naturalist. 

His next example is a criticism of the theory of Sexual 
Selection. Speaking . of apes, he says: "When we consider 
what is known of the emotional nature of these animals 
and the periodicity of its intensification, it is hardly credible 
that a female would often risk life or limb through her ad- 
miration of a trifling shade of color or an innnitesimally 
greater, though irresistibly fascinating degree of wartiness." 
Is it credible that Mr. Mivart can suppose that the higher 
or spiritual emotions, like affection, taste, conscience, ever 
act directly to modify or compete with the more energetic 
lower impulses, and not rather by forestalling and indirectly 
regulating them, as by avoiding temptation in the case of con- 
science; or by establishing social arrangements, companion- 
ships, friendships, and more or less permanent marriages in 
the case of sexual preferences ? All such arrangements, all 
grounds for the action of taste or admiration, or any but the 
most monstrous friendships, are prevented or removed in the 
lives of caged beasts. His example and his inference from it 
are as much as if an explorer should discover a half-famished 
tribe of savages sustaining life upon bitter and nauseous food, 
and should conclude that not only these but all savages, the 
most provident, or even all men, are without any choice in 
food, and that in providing for future wants they are influ- 
enced by no other considerations than the grossest cravings of 
appetite. 

But to return to Natural Selection. The next example is 



i58 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



that of the rattling and expanding powers of poisonous snakes. 
The author says that "in poisonous serpents, also, we have 
structures which, at all events, at first sight, seem positively 
hurtful to these reptiles. Such are the rattle of the rattlesnake 
and the expanding neck of the cobra, the former serving to 
warn the ear of the intended victim as the latter warns the 
eye." This "first sight" is all the use our author discovers in 
these organs; but why should these warnings be intended or 
used to drive away intended victims rather than enemies? Or 
is it among the intentions of nature to defeat those of the ser- 
pent? If the effects of such "warnings" really were to 
deprive these snakes of their proper food, would not experience 
itself and intelligence be sufficient in the wily serpent to correct 
such perverse instincts? It is, indeed, at first sight, curious 
that certain snakes, though these are the sluggish kinds, and 
cannot so easily escape their enemies by flight as others can, 
should be provided, not only with poisonous fangs, but with 
these means of warning either victims or dangerous enemies. 
But Mr. Wallace has furnished a clew to their correlation by 
his example of the relations between conspicuous colors and 
nauseous tastes in many caterpillars, the color serving as a sign 
of the taste and warning birds not to touch these kinds. The 
poisonous fang and its use are expensive and risky means of 
defense; the warnings associated with them are cheap and 
safe. But if, as is very likely, these "warnings" are also used 
against intended victims, they can only be used either to 
paralyze them with terror or allure them from curiosity, or to 
produce in them that curious and paralyzing mixture of the two 
emotions, alarm and something like curiosity, which is all that 
is probably true of the supposed powers of fascination * in ser- 
pents. Perhaps, also, the rattle serves to inspire the sluggish 
snake itself with courage; and in this case the rattle will serve 

* This is a real condition of mind in the subject of it; a condition in which interest or 
emotion gives to an idea such fixity and power that it takes possession at a fatal mo- 
ment of the will and acts itself out; as in the fascination of the precipice. It is not, 
however, to be regarded as a natural contrivance in the mental acquisitions of the vic- 
tims for the benefit of the serpent any more than the serpent's warnings are for their 
benefit ; but as a consequence of ultimate mental laws in general, of which the serpent s 
faculties and habits take advantage. 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 



159 



all the purposes that drums, trumpets, and gongs do in human 
warfare. The swaying body and vibrating tongue of most 
snakes, and the expanding neck and the hood of the cobras, 
may serve for banners. But the rattle has also been supposed 
to serve as a sexual call, very much as the inspirations of war- 
fare are turned into the allurements of the tournament, or as 
gongs also serve to call travelers to dinner. What poverty of 
resources in regard to the relations of use in the lives of ani- 
mals thus distinguishes our naturalist from the natural order 
of things ! What wealth and capital are left for the employ- 
ments and industries of Natural Selection ! 

In the next chapter Mr. Mivart charges the theory of Natural 
Selection with inability to account for independent similarities 
of structure; "that it does not harmonize with the co-existence 
of closely similar structures of diverse origin," like the dental 
structures in the dog and in the carnivorous marsupial, the 
Thylacine, closely similar structures and of exactly the same 
utilities, though belonging to races so diverse that their com- 
mon ancestors could not have been like them in respect to this 
resemblance. But these structures really differ in points not 
essential to their utilities; in characters which, though incon- 
spicuous, are marks of the two great divisions of mammalia, 
to which these animals belong. Mr. Mivart here attacks the 
theory in its very citadel, and has incautiously left a hostile 
force in his rear. He has claimed in the preceding chapter 
for Natural Selection that it ought to have produced several 
independent races of long-necked Ungulates, as well as the 
giraffe; so that, instead of pursuing his illustrations any further, 
we may properly demand his surrender. Of course Natural 
Selection requires for similar products similar means and con- 
ditions; but these are of such a general sort that they belong 
to wide ranges of life; and as it does not act by "blind 
chance," or theological accidents, but by the invariable laws of 
nature and the tentative powers of life, it is not surprising that 
it often repeats its patterns independently of descent, or of the 
copying powers of inheritance. 

That the highest products of nature are not the results of 
the mere forces of inheritance, and do not come from the birth 



j6o philosophical discussions. 

of latent powers and structures, seems to be the lesson of the 
obscure discourse in which Jesus endeavored to instruct Nico- 
demus the Pharisee. How is it that a man can be born again, 
acquire powers and characters that are not developments of 
what is already innate in him ? How is it possible when he 
is old to acquire new innate principles, or to enter a second 
time into his mother's womb and be born ? The reply does 
not suggest our author's hypothesis of a life turning over upon 
a new " facet," or a new set of latent inherited powers. Only 
the symbols, water and the Spirit, which Christians have ever 
since worshiped, are given in reply; but the remarkable illus- 
tration of the accidentality of nature is added, which has been 
almost equally though independently admired. " Marvel not 
that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. The wind blow- 
eth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but 
canst not tell whence it cometh and whither it goeth; so is 
every one that is born of the Spirit." The highest products of 
nature are the outcome of its total and apparently accidental 
orders; or are born of water and the Spirit, which symbolize 
creative power. To this the Pharisee replied: "How can 
these things be?" And the answer is still more significant: 
"Art thou a master of Israel and knowest not these things ?" 
We bring natural evidences, "and ye receive not our witness. 
If I have told you earthly (natural) things, and ye believe not, 
how shall ye believe if I tell you heavenly (supernatural) 
things ? " The bearing of our subject upon the doctrine of Final 
Causes in natural history has been much discussed and is of 
considerable importance to our author's theory and criticism. 
But we propose, not only to distinguish between this branch of 
theology and the theories of inductive science on one hand, 
but still more emphatically, on the other hand, between it and 
the Christian faith in divine superintendency, which is very lia- 
ble to be confounded with it. The Christian faith is that even 
the fall of a sparrow is included in this agency, and that as men 
are of more value than many sparrows, so much more is their 
security. So far from weakening this faith by showing the 
connection between value and security, science and the theory 
of Natural Selection have confirmed it. The very agencies 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 161 

that give values to life secure them by planting them most 
broadly in the immutable grounds of utility. But Natural 
Theology has sought by Platonic, not Christian, imaginations 
to discover, not the relations of security to value, but some- 
thing worthy to be the source of the value considered as abso- 
lute, some particular worthy source of each valued end. This 
is the motive of that speculation of Final Causes which Bacon 
condemned as sterile and corrupting to philosophy, interfering, 
as it does, with the study of the facts of nature, or of what is, 
by preconceptions, necessarily imperfect as to what ought to be; 
and by deductions from assumed ends, thought worthy to be 
the purposes of nature. The naturalists who " take care not 
to ascribe to God any intention," sin rather against the spirit 
of Platonism than that of Christianity, while obeying the pre- 
cepts of experimental philosophy. Though, as our author 
says, in speaking of the moral sense and the impossibility, as 
he thinks, that the accumulations of small repugnances could 
give rise to the strength of its abhorrence and reprobation; 
though, as he says, " no stream can rise higher than its source"; 
while fully admitting the truth of this, we would still ask, 
Where is its source? Surely not in the little fountains that 
Platonic explorers go in search of, a priori, which would soon 
run dry but for the rains of heaven, the water and the vapor 
of the distilling atmosphere. Out of this come also the almost 
weightless snow-flakes, which, combined in masses of great 
gravity, fall in the avalanche. The results of moralizing Pla- 
tonism should not be confounded with the simple Christian 
faith in Divine superintendence. The often-quoted belief of 
Professor Gray, "that variation has been led along certain 
beneficial lines, like a stream along definite lines of irrigation," 
might be interpreted to agree with either view. The lines on 
which variations are generally useful are lines of search, and 
their particular successes, dependent, it is true, on no theo- 
logical or absolute accidents, may be regarded as being lines 
of beneficial variations, seeing that they have resulted through 
laws of nature and principles of utility in higher living forms, 
or even in continuing definite forms of life on the earth. But 
thousands of movements of variation, or efforts of search, have 



!62 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

not succeeded to one that has. These are not continued along 
evil lines, since thousands of forms have perished in conse- 
quence of them for every one that has survived. 

The growth of a tree is a good illustration of this process, 
and more closely resembles the action of selection in nature 
generally than might at first sight appear ; for its branches are 
selected growths, a few out of many thousands that have begun 
in buds ; and this rigorous Selection has been effected by the 
accidents that have determined in surviving growths superior 
relations to their supplies of nutriment in the trunk and in ex- 
posure to light and air. This exposure (as great as is consist- 
ent with secure connection with the sources of sap) seems 
actually to be sought, and the form of the tree to be the result 
of some foresight in it. But the real seeking process is bud- 
ding, and the geometrical regularity of the production of buds 
in twigs has little or nothing to do with the ultimate selected 
results, the distributions of the branches, which are different for 
each individual tree. Even if the determinate variations really 
existed, — the "facets" of stable equilibrium in life, which Mr. 
Mivart supposes, — and were arranged with geometrical regu- 
larity on their spheroid of potential forms, as leaves and buds 
are in the twig, they would probably have as little to do with 
determining the ultimate diversities of life under the action of 
the selection which our author admits, as phyllotaxy has to 
do with the branching of trees. But phyllotaxy, also, has 
its utility. Its orders are the best for packing the incipient 
leaves in the bud, and the best for the exposure to light and 
air of the developed leaves of the stem. But here its utility 
ends, except so far as its arrangements also present the great- 
est diversity of finite elements, within the smallest limits, for 
the subsequent choice of successful growths ; being the nearest 
approaches that finite regularity could make io "indefinite vari- 
ations in all conceivable directions." The general resemblance 
of trees of a given kind depends on no formative principle other 
than physical and physiological properties in the woody tissue, 
and is related chiefly to the tenacity, flexibility, and vascularity 
of this tissue, the degrees of which might almost be inferred 
from the general form of the tree. It cannot be doubted, in 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 



163 



the case pf the tree, that this tentative though regular budding 
has been of service to the production of the tree's growth, and 
that the particular growths which have survived and become 
the bases of future growths were determined by a beneficial 
though accidental order of events under the total orders of the 
powers concerned in the tree's development. But if a rigorous 
selection had not continued in this growth, no proper branching 
would have resulted. The tree would have grown like a cab- 
bage. Hence it is to selection, and not to variation, — or rather 
to the causes of selection, and not to those of variation, — that 
species, or well-marked and widely separated forms of life, are 
due. If we could study the past and present forms of life, not 
only in different continents, which we may compare to different 
individual trees of the same kind, or better, perhaps, to different 
main branches from the same trunk and roots, but could also 
study the past and present forms of life in different planets, then 
diversities in the general outlines would probably be seen sim- 
ilar to those which distinguish different kinds of trees, as the 
oak, the elm, and the pine ; dependent, as in these trees, on 
differences in the physical and physiological properties of living 
matters in the different planets, — supposing the planets, of 
course, to be capable of sustaining life, like the earth, or, at 
least, to have been so at some period in the history of the solar 
system. We might find that these general outlines of life in 
other planets resemble elms or oaks, and are not pyramidal in 
form like the pine, with a "crowning" anima^like man to lead 
their growths. For man, for aught we know or could guess, 
but for the highly probable accidents of nature, which blight 
the topmost terminal bud and give ascendency to some lateral 
one, except for these accidents, man may have always been 
the crown of earthly creation, or always "man," if you choose 
so to name and define the creature who, though once an as- 
cidian (when the ascidian was the highest form of life), may 
have been the best of the ascidians. This would, perhaps, add 
nothing to the present value of the race, but it might satisfy 
the Platonic demand that the race, though not derived from a 
source quite worthy of it, yet should come from the best in 
nature. 



j64. philosophical dlscusslons. 

We are thus led to the final problem, at present an appar- 
ently insoluble mystery, of the origin of the first forms of life 
on the earth. On this Mr. Darwin uses the figurative language 
of religious mystery, and speaks " of life with its several pow- 
ers being originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms 
or into one." For this expression Mr. Mivart takes him to 
task, though really it could mean no more than if the gravita- 
tive properties of bodies were referred directly to the agency 
of a First Cause, in which the philosopher professed to believe; 
at the same time expressing his unwillingness to make hypoth- 
eses, that is, transcendental hypotheses, concerning occult modes 
of action. But life is, indeed, divine, and there is grandeur 
in the view, as Mr. Darwin says, which derives from so simple 
yet mysterious an origin, and "from the war of nature, from fam- 
ine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable 
of conceiving, namely, the production of the higher animals." 
Mr. Mivart, however, is much more "advanced" than Mr. 
Darwin on the question of the origin of life or archigenesis, 
and the possibility of it as a continuous and present operation 
of nature. He admits what is commonly called "spontane- 
ous generation," believing it, however, to be not what in the- 
ology is understood by "spontaneous," but only a sudden 
production of life by chemical synthesis out of inorganic ele- 
ments. The absence of decisive evidence on this point does 
not deter him, but the fact that the doctrine can be reconciled 
to the strictest orthodoxy, and accords well with our author's 
theory of sudden changes in species, appears to satisfy him 
of its truth. The theory of Pangenesis, on the other hand, 
invented by Mr. Darwin for a different purpose, though not 
inconsistent with the very slow generation of vital forces out 
of chemical actions, — slow, that is, and insignificant compared 
to the normal actions and productions of chemical forces, — is 
hardly compatible with the sudden and conspicuous appear- 
ance of new life under the microscope of the observer. This 
theory was invented like other provisional theories, — like New- 
ton's corpuscular theory of light, like the undulatory theory of 
light (though this is no longer provisional), and like the chem- 
ical theory of atoms, — for the purpose of giving a material or 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 



l6 5 



visual basis to the phenomena and empirical laws of life in 
general, by embodying in such supposed properties the phe- 
nomena of development, the laws of inheritance, and the vari- 
ous modes of reproduction, just as the chemical theory of atoms 
embodies in visual and tangible properties the laws of definite 
and multiple proportions, and the relations of gaseous volumes 
in chemical unions, together with the principle of isomerism 
and the relations of equivalent weights to specific heats. The 
theory of Pangenesis presents life and vital forces in their ulti- 
mate and essential elements as perfectly continuous, and in 
great measure isolated from other and coarser orders of forces, 
like the chemical and mechanical, except so far as these are the 
necessary theatres of their actions. Gemmules, or vital mole- 
cules, the smallest bodies which have separable parts under the 
action of vital forces, and of the same order as the scope of 
action in these forces, — these minute bodies, though probably 
as much smaller than chemical molecules as these are smaller 
than rocks or pebbles, may yet exist in unorganized materials 
as well as in the germs of eggs, seeds, and spores, just as crys- 
talline structures or chemical aggregations may be present in 
bodies whose form and aggregation are mainly due to mechan- 
ical forces. And, as in mechanical aggregations (like sediment- 
ary rocks), chemical actions and aggregations slowly supervene 
and give in the metamorphosis of these rocks an irregular crysT 
talline structure, so it is supposable that finer orders of forces 
lying at the heart of fluid matter may slowly produce imperfect 
and irregular vital aggregations. But definite vital aggrega- 
tions and definite actions of vital forces exist, for the most part, 
in a world by themselves, as distinct from that of chemical 
forces, actions, and aggregations as these are from the mechan- 
ical ones of dynamic surface-geology, which produce and are 
embodied in visible and tangible masses through forces the 
most directly apparent and best understood; or as distinct as 
these are from the internal forces of geology and the masses 
of continents and mountain formations with which they deal; 
or as distinct again as these are from the actions of gravity and 
the masses in the solar system ; or, again, as these are from the 
unknown forces and conditions that regulate sidereal aggrega- 



i66 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

tions and movements. And as to the size of the gemmules, the 
various orders of molecular sizes are limited in our powers of 
conception only by the needs of hypothesis in the representation 
of actual phenomena under visual forms and properties. Sir 
William Thomson has lately determined the probable sizes of 
chemical molecules from the phenomena of light, and experi- 
ments relating to the law of the "conservation of force." Ac- 
cording to these results, these sizes are such that if a drop of 
water were to be magnified to the size of the earth, its molecules, 
or parts dependent on the forces of chemical physics, would be 
seen to range from the size of a pea to that of a billiard-ball. 
But there is no reason to doubt that in every such molecule 
there are still subordinate parts and structures; or that, even in 
these parts, a still finer order of parts and structures exists, at 
least to the extent of assimilated growth and simple division. 
Mr. Darwin supposes such growths and divisions in the vital 
gemmules; but our author objects (p. 230) that, " to admit 
the power of spontaneous division and multiplication in such 
rudimentary structures seems a complete contradiction. The 
gemmules, by the hypothesis of Pangenesis, are the ultimate 
organized components of the body, the absolute organic atoms 
of which each body is composed; how then can they be divisi- 
ble? Any part of a gemmule would be an impossible (because 
less than possible) quantity. If it is divisible into still smaller 
organic wholes, as a germ-cell is, it must be made up, as the 
germ-cell is, of subordinate component atoms, which are then 
the true gemmules." But this is to suppose what is not im- 
plied in the theory (nor properly even in the chemical theory 
of atoms), that the sizes of these bodies are any more constant 
or determinate than those of visible bodies of any order. It is 
the order only that is determinate; but within it there may be 
wide ranges of sizes. A billiard-ball may be divided into parts 
as small as a pea, or peas may be aggregated into masses as 
large as a billiard-ball, without going beyond the order of forces 
that produce both sizes. Our author himself says afterwards 
and in another connection (p. 290), " It is possible that, in 
some minds, the notion may lurk that such powers are simpler 
and easier to understand, because the bodies they affect are so 



THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. 167 

minute ! This absurdity hardly bears stating. .We can easily 
conceive a being so small that a gemmule would be to it as 
large as St. Paul's would be to us." This argument, however, 
is intended to discredit the theory on the ground that it does 
not tend to simplify matters, and that we must rest somewhere 
in "what the scholastics called 'substantial forms.'" But this 
criticism, to be just, ought to insist, not only that vital phe- 
nomena are due to "a special nature, a peculiar innate power 
and activity," but that - chemical atoms only complicate the 
mysteries of science unnecessarily; that corpuscles and undu- 
lations only hide difficulties; and that we ought to explain 
very simply that crystalline bodies are produced by " polarity," 
and that the phenomena of light and vision are the effects of 
"luminosity." This kind of simplicity is not, however, the 
purpose which modern science has in view; and, consequently, 
our real knowledges, as well as our hypotheses, are much more 
complicated than were those of the schoolmen. It is not 
impossible that vital phenomena themselves include orders of 
•forces as distinct as the lowest vital are from chemical phe- 
nomena. May not the contrast of merely vital or vegetative 
phenomena with those of se7isibility be of such orders ? But, 
in arriving at sensibility, we have reached the very elements 
out of which the conceptions of size and movement are con- 
structed, — the elements of the tactual and visual constructions 
that are employed by such hypotheses. Can sensibility and 
the movements governed by it be derived directly by chem- 
ical synthesis from the forces of inorganic elements? It is 
probable,, both from analogy and direct observation, that they 
cannot (though some of the believers in " spontaneous genera- 
tion" think otherwise); or that they cannot, except by that 
great alchemic experiment which, employing all the influences 
of nature and all the ages of the world, has actually brought 
forth most if not all of the definite forms of life in the last and 
greatest work of creative power. 



EVOLUTION BY NATURAL SELECTION.* 

The physical problem, proposed independently and almost 
simultaneously near the beginning of this century by three 
eminent men of genius, Goethe, Geoffroy St. Hilaire, and 
the elder Darwin, how animals and plants came to have the 
structures and habits that characterize them as distinct species, 
this question which was proposed in place of the teleolog- 
ical inquiry, why they were so produced, has now fairly be- 
come a simple question for scientific investigation. There is no 
longer any doubt that this effect was by some natural process, 
and was not by a formless creative fiat. Moreover, there 
scarcely remains any doubt that this natural process connects 
the living forms of the present with very different forms in the 
past; and that this connection is properly described in general 
terms as "descent with modification." The question has thus 
become narrowed down to the inquiry, What is the nature of 
this modification, or what are the causes and the modes of ac- 
tion by which such modifications have been effected ? 

This is a great step in scientific progress. So long as a doubt 
remained about the fact that such modifications have been ef- 
fected, and that present living forms are the results of them, 
the inquiry, how they were effected, belonged to the region of 
profitless speculation, — profitless except for this, that specu- 
lative minds, boldly laying aside doubts which perplex and 
impede others, and anticipating their solution, have often in 
the history of science, by preparing a way for further progress, 
greatly facilitated their actual solution. Difficulties and ques- 
tions lying beyond such doubts — walls to scale after outworks 

* Frotfi the North American Review, July, 1872. 






E VOL UTION BY NA TURA L SELECTION. 



169 



and ditches are passed — do not inspire the cautious with cour- 
age. And so the scientific world waited, though prepared with 
ample force of evidence, and hesitated to take the step which 
would bring it face to face with the questions of the present 
and the future. Darwin's " Origin of Species," by marshaling 
and largely reinforcing the evidences of evolution, and by can- 
didly estimating the opposing evidence, and still more by 
pointing out a way to the solution of the greatest difficulty, 
gave the signal and the word of encouragement which effected 
a movement that had long been impending. 

The "that," the fact of evolution, maybe regarded as estab- 
lished. The "how," the theory or explanation of it, is the 
problem immediately before us. Its solution will require many 
years" of patient investigation, and much discussion may be 
anticipated, which will doubtless sometimes degenerate into 
acrimonious disputes, more especially in the immediate future, 
while what may be called the dialectics of the subject are being 
developed, and while the bearings and the limits of views and 
questions are being determined, and conceptions and definitions 
and kinds of arguments appropriate to the discussion, are the 
subjects on which it is necessary to come to a common under- 
standing. It is highly desirable that this discussion should 
be as free as possible from mere personalities, and there is 
strong hope that it may be kept so through the manners and 
methods of procedure established by means of the experience 
which the history of modern science affords. That it is 
impossible, however, to avoid errors of this sort altogether, is 
evident from the provocations experienced and keenly felt by 
some of the noblest of modern students of science in the estab- 
lishment of theories in modern astronomy, and of theories in 
geology, to which may now be added the theory of evolution. 
That the further discussion of rival hypotheses on the causes 
and modes of evolution will profit by these older examples may 
be hoped, since there have grown up general methods of inves- 
tigation and discussion, which prescribe limits and precautions 
for hypothesis and inference, and establish rules for the con- 
duct of debate on scientific subjects, that have been of the 
greatest value to the progress of science, and will, if faithfully 



170 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



observed, doubtless direct the present discussion to a successful 
issue. 

These methods are analogous in their purposes to the gen- 
eral rules in courts of law, and constitute the principles of 
method in experimental philosophy, or in philosophy founded 
on the sciences of observation. They serve to protect an 
investigation, by demanding that it shall be allowed on cer- 
tain pretty strict conditions (in the conduct of experiments 
and observations, and in the formation and verification of 
hypotheses) to proceed without hindrance from prejudice 
for any existing doctrine or opinion. An investigation may 
thus start from the simplest basis of experience, and, for this 
purpose, may waive, yet without denying, any presumption or 
conclusion held in existing theories or doctrines. Again, these 
rules protect an investigation from a one-sided criticism or ex 
/prejudgment, since they demand of the criticism or judgment 
the same judicial attitude that is demanded of the investiga- 
tion. Advocacy, and especially the sort that is of essential 
value in courts of law, where two advocates are set against 
each other, each with the duty of presenting only what can be 
said for his own side, and where the same judge and jury are 
bound to hear both, is singularly out of place in a scientific 
discussion, unless in oral debate before the tribunal of a sci- 
entific society. Moreover, there are no burdens of proof in 
science. Such advocacy in a published work claiming scien- 
tific consideration is almost an offense against the proprieties 
of such discussions. To collect together in one place all that 
can be said for an hypothesis, and in another all that can be 
said against it, is at best a clumsy and inconvenient method of 
discussion, the natural results of which may best be seen in the 
present condition of theological and religious doctrines. These 
practical considerations are of the utmost importance for the 
attainment of the end of scientific pursuit; which is not to 
arrive at decisions or judgments that are probably true, but is 
the discovery of the real truths of nature, for which science 
can afford to wait, and for which suspended judgments are the 
soundest substitutes. 

No work of science, ancient or modern, dealing with prob- 



EVOLUTION BY NATURAL SELECTION. 171 

lematic views and doctrines, has more completely conformed 
to these principles, or more fully justified them by its success, 
than the " Origin of Species." For its real or principal success 
has been in convincing nearly all naturalists, a majority of 
whom, at least, were still unconvinced, of the truth of the 
theory of evolution; and this has resulted from its obvious 
fairness and spirit of caution almost as much as from the pre- 
ponderance of the evidences for the theory when thus pre- 
sented. And the very same qualities of spirit and method 
governed the leading and more strictly original design of the 
work, which cannot, however, yet be said to be a complete 
success, namely, the explanatio?i of evolution by natural selec- 
tion. That Mr. Darwin himself is fully convinced of the truth 
of this explanation is sufficiently evident. He holds that natu- 
ral selection is the principal or leading cause in determining the 
changes and diversities of species, though not the only cause of 
the development of their characters. Conspicuously at the close 
of the Introduction in the first edition of the work, and in all 
subsequent editions, occur these words : "lam convinced that 
Natural Selection has been the most important, but not the ex- 
clusive, means of modification." That the work is not a merely 
dialectical performance is clear; and it is equally clear that 
in proportion to the strength of the author's conviction is his 
solicitude to give full and just weight to all valid objections to 
it. In this respect the work stands in marked contrast to much 
that has been written on the subject and in reply to it. 

Once to leave the vantage-ground of scientific method and 
adopt the advocate's ex parte mode of discussion almost neces- 
sitates a continuance of the discussion under this most incon- 
venient form. Mr. Mivart's " Genesis of Species," which we 
examined in this Review last July, though a conspicuous exam- 
ple of such a one-sided treatment of a proper scientific question, 
was by a writer so distinguished for his attainments in science 
that his criticism could not well be passed by without notice; 
and, having also the character of a popular treatise, it came 
within a wider province of criticism tha/ that of strictly scien- 
tific reviews. Our notice of his work was chiefly devoted to sup- 
plying something of what could be and had been said in favor 



I j2 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

of the theory thus criticised, both by way of denning and de- 
fending it. We also followed the author to some extent into 
the consideration of a subject, namely, the general philosophical 
and theological bearings of this theory, which does not, we en t 
deavored to show, belong properly to the discussion, and ought 
to be kept in abeyance, so long, at least, as the laws of exper- 
imental philosophy are observed in the conduct of the inquiry. 
One of the first questions asked in past times in regard to phys- 
ical hypotheses, which have now become established theories 
or doctrines of science, was, if they were orthodox, or at 
least theistic; and the negative decision of this question by 
what was deemed competent authority determined temporarily 
and in a measure the fate of the hypothesis and the standing 
of those who held to it. It was to be hoped that, in the light 
of such a history, this discussion could be spared the question, 
at least till the hypothesis could be fairly tried, when, if it 
should be found wanting in scientific validity, its banishment 
to the limbo of exploded errors might, without much harm, be 
changed to a severer sentence ; and, if it should withstand the 
tests of purely scientific criticism, the same means of reconcil- 
ing it to orthodoxy would doubtless be found as in the case of 
older physical hypotheses. Mr. Mivart himself claimed and 
argued a similar exemption for the general theory of evolution, 
or rather attempted the later office of reconciliation, or the af- 
fording of proofs of its conformity to the most venerable and 
authoritative decisions of orthodoxy. But he appeared unwill- 
ing to allow either such an exemption, or the possibility of an 
accordance with orthodoxy, to the theory of natural selection, 
for he more than once quoted and applied to the discussion of 
this theory the saying and supposed opinions of an heretical 
heathen philosopher, Democritus. 

In his reply to our criticisms,* he wonders who could have 
so misled us as to make us suppose that his was a " theological 
education" and a "schooling against Democritus"; the fact 
being just the reverse of this, his education being in that ph-i- 

* See the number of the North American Review for April, 1872. Mr. Mivart has 
reprinted his reply, without notice of the present essay, in his volume entitled, "Les- 
sons from Nature," London, 1876. 



EVOLUTION BY NATURAL SELECTION. 



173 



losophy of "nescience," out Of the evils and fallacies of which 
he had at length struggled. Clearly we were misled by the 
author himself. Our error, slight except as a biographical one, 
would have been amended if we had referred the character of 
his criticism to his theological studies. This would have left 
the period in his life in which he acquired his mode of thought 
and discussion as undetermined, as it was unimportant to the 
point of our criticism; since, through the influence of these 
studies, or similar dialectical pursuits, his unquestionable abili- 
ties appeared to us to have been developed, and, as we believe, 
misapplied. It was the bringing in of "the fortuitous concourse 
of atoms," and "blind chance," "accidents," and "hap-hazard 
results," in a discussion with which they had no more to do, 
and no less, than they have to do with geology, meteorology, 
politics, philosophical history, or political economy. It was 
this irrelevancy in his criticism which we regarded as oblivious 
of the age in which we live and for which he wrote, — the age 
of experimental philosophy. Mr. Mivart thinks he is clear of 
all blame for speaking of the theory of natural selection as lia- 
ble "to lead men to regard the present organic world as 
formed, so to speak, accidentally, beautiful and wonderful as is 
confessedly the hap-hazard result," since he qualified the word 
"accidentally" by the phrase "so to speak." The real fault 
was in speaking so at all. 

Accidents in the ordinary every-day sense are causes in 
every concrete course of events, — in the weather, in history, in 
politics, in the market, — and no theory of these events can 
leave them out. Explanation of the events consists in show- 
ing how they will result, or have resulted, through certain fixed 
principles or laws of action from the occasions or opportunities, 
which such accidents present. Given the state of the atmos- 
phere over a large district in respect to temperature, moisture, 
pressure, and motion, — none of which could have been antici- 
pated without similar data for a short time before, all in fact 
being accidents, — and the physical principles of meteorology 
might enable us to explain the weather that immediately fol- 
lows. So with the events of history, etc. In no other sense 
are accidents supposed as causes in the theory of natural selec- 



174 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



X 



tion. Accidental variations and surrounding conditions of 
existence, and the previous condition of the organic world, 
(none of which could have been anticipated from anything we 
actually know, all in fact being "accidents") — these are the 
causes which present the occasions or opportunities through 
which principles of utility and advantage are brought to bear 
in changing structures and habits, and improving their adap- 
tations. If this is like the philosophy of Democritus, or any 
other excommunicated philosopher of antiquity, and is, there- 
fore, to be condemned for the heresy, then all the sciences 
with which we have compared it, and many others, the con- 
quests of human intelligence, must share the condemnation. 

We dwelt in our review, perhaps unnecessarily, on the fact 
that accidents in this sense, and in the theory of natural selec- 
tion, as well as elsewhere, are relative to our knowledge of 
causes; that the same event, like an eclipse of the sun, might 
be an accident to one mind, and an anticipated event to an- 
other. We did so because we could not understand otherwise 
why our author should single out the theory of natural selection 
from analogous theories and sciences for a special criticism of 
this sort; or except on the idea that the accidents in natural 
selection were supposed by him to be exceptional, and of the 
type which Democritus is reputed to have put in the place of 
intelligent design, or on the throne of Nous. We did not, as 
Mr. Mivart imagines, think him "ignorant that the various 
phenomena which we observe in nature have their respective 
phenomenal antecedents," nor suppose that he "held the 
opinion that phenomena of variation, etc., are not determined 
by definite, invariable, physical antecedents." We only 
thought that, knowing better,- — knowing that "natural selec- 
tion," like every other physical theory, dealt with physical 
causes and their laws, — he was unjust and inconsistent in con- 
demning the employment of it, as a leading or prominent cause, 
in explanation of the phenomena of the organic world, in the 
manner in which he did; except on the hypothesis, which we 
repudiated in behalf of experimental philosophy but without 
positively attributing it to him, — the hypothesis of absolute 
accidents. It was inconsistency and irrelevancy which we 
meant to attribute to him. 



E VOL UTION B Y NA TURA L SELECTION. 



J 75 



That he supposed absolute accidents to be meant in the an- 
cient atheistical philosophy appeared from a passage in his chap- 
ter on Theology and Evolution (p. 276), in which he speaks 
of the kind of action we might expect in physical nature from 
a theistic point of view, as an action " which is orderly, which 
disaccords with the action of blind chance and with the ' fortui- 
tous concourse of atoms' of Democritus." But in his reply to 
us he repudiates the idea that this old philosophy held events 
to be accidental in the strict sense; and he further says of us 
that we "know very well that Democritus and Empedocles 
and their school no more held phenomena to be undetermined 
or unpreceded by other phenomena than do their successors at 
the present day." We are far from being so well informed, or 
willing to accept this as a statement of our views. For, in the 
first place, the terms "undetermined" and "unpreceded" are 
not synonymous. Moreover, so far as phenomena are deter- 
mined, they are "orderly," "harmonize with man's reason" 
(p. 275), though in their complexity they may be quite beyond 
the power of any man's imagination to represent or disen- 
tangle; and, as our author has said, they are what we might 
expect "from a theistic point of view." 

Whether Democritus believed in absolute accidents or not 
we do not know. Little is really known of his opinions in this 
respect. The question has been disputed, but not decided. 
All his works are lost, except a few quoted sentences and max- 
ims. He is in a peculiarly exposed condition for an attack from 
any one disposed to be his opponent. The words ascribed to 
him are unprotected by contexts, or by the scruples an oppo- 
nent might feel about their meaning were he assigning to him 
his place in the history of speculation. It is very likely that 
he did not hold to absolute accidents as occurring in the 
course of nature; though it is very doubtful whether he was 
so thoroughly convinced as his "successors of the present 
day" are of the universality of the "law of causation," or that 
every event must have determinant antecedents. The concep- 
tion of cause, as based by experimental science on the ele- 
mentary invariable orders of phenomenal successions, is, even 
at the present day, altogether too precise and abstract for the 



176 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

apprehension of a mind untrained by scientific studies. How 
much more so must it have been when among the old Ionian, 
philosophers the first crude conceptions of science were being 
fashioned by attempts at discovering the physical bond of 
union and the inchoate form of nature, regarded as a universe. 
It is an anachronism to speak of these philosophers as mate- 
rialists and atheists, since the distinctions and questions which 
could make such a classification intelligible had not yet been, 
proposed. And it is equally an anachronism to attribute 
even to later thinkers, like Democritus, such a conception of 
physical causation as only the latest and maturest products of 
scientific thought have rendered definite. 

There can be no antithesis in the problem of the beginning 
of the world between accident and law, that is, between accident 
and the orderly movements which imply determinant antece- 
dents. The real antithesis is between accident and miracle, 
that is, between accident and the extraordinary action of pre- 
existent designing intelligence; and in this relation Accident 
can only have an absolute meaning, equivalent in fact to Des- 
tiny or Fate, when unintelligible. Unintelligible Destiny or 
"blind chance" is directly opposed to the intelligible Destiny 
which is the principle of "law" in nature; though these have 
often been confounded as equally fatalistic and atheistical. Mr. 
Mivart, however, does not confound them; for he has said that 
the latter is what we might expect from a theistic point of view. 
It is altogether likely, however, that the Democritus to whom the 
former meaning could be attributed as a characteristic one is 
not the real thinker, but is a myth; or is rather the orthodox 
lay-figure of atheism of the theological studio. 

The reputation for atheism which the real Democritus doubt- 
less had may have come from a cause which has often pro- 
duced it in the history of physical science. He invented a 
theory of atoms with which he attempted physical explanations 
quite in advance of previous speculations. And the invention 
of physical hypotheses has often been regarded as an invasion 
of the province and jurisdiction of divine power and a first 
cause. For men rarely allow the explanation of any impor- 
tant effect in nature to remain an open question. If observed 



E VOL UTION BY NA TURA L SELECTION. 



177 



of inferred physical causes do not suffice, invisible or even 
spiritual ones are invented; and thus the ground is preoccu- 
pied, and closed against the inquiries of the physical phi- 
losopher. It is probably the general direction or tendency of 
these inquiries, rather than any positive positions or results at 
which they may arrive, which puts the physical philosopher in 
an apparently irreligious attitude. For in following out. the 
consequences of physical hypotheses into the details of natural 
phenomena, reasoning from supposed causes to their effects, his 
interests and his modes of thought are the reverse of those of 
mankind in general, and of the religious mind. He appears to 
turn his back on divinity, and though seeking to approach 
nearer the first cause, or the total order of nature, his aspect of 
looking downward from a proximate principle through a nat- 
ural order appears to the popular view to be darkened by a 
sombre shadow. The theory of universal gravitation was con- 
demned on this account for impiety by even so liberal and en- 
lightened a thinker as Leibnitz. This seems very strange to us 
now, since the law of gravitation is almost as familiar as fire, 
or even gravity itself. When in ancient times any one had 
burned his fingers, or been bruised by a fall, one did not, except 
perhaps in early childhood, attribute the harm to a person, a 
spirit, or a god, but to the qualities of fire or gravity; yet the 
sounds of the thunder were still referred directly to Zeus. 
We all remember how in the "Clouds" of Aristophanes the 
comic poet puts impiety in the mouth of Socrates, or the doc- 
trine that Zeus does not exist, and that it is ethereal Vortex, 
reigning in his stead, which drives the clouds and makes them 
rain and thunder. Such a view of physical inquiries is not 
confined to comic poets or their audiences. The meteorolog- 
ical sophists of that day were in very much the same position 
as the Darwinian evolutionists of the present time. 

However important it may be to bear these considerations in 
mind, there is, as we have said, no more occasion to do so with 
reference to the theory of natural selection than with reference 
to many other analogous theories, not only in physical science, 
like those of meteorology and geology (including the theory of 
evolution), but also in sociological science, like theories of po- 



I7 8 • PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

litical economy, and those theories of history which explain 
the growth of institutions, governments, and national charac- 
teristics. The comparison of the continuous order in time of 
the organic world and its total aspect at any period, to the pro- 
gressive changes and the particular aspect at any time of the 
weather, will, doubtless, strike many minds as inapt, since the 
latter phenomena are the type to us of indetermination and 
chance, while the former present to us the most conspicuous 
evidences of orderly determination and design. This con- 
trast, though conspicuous, is, nevertheless, not essential to the 
contrasted orders themselves. The movements in one are al- 
most infinitely slower than in the other. We see a single phase 
and certain orderly details in one. We see only confused and 
rapid combinations and successions in the other. One is seen 
in fine, the other in gross form. But looked at from the same 
point of view, regarding each as an ensemble of details in time 
and space, they are equally without definite order or intelligible 
plan; "beautiful and wonderful as is," according to Mr. 
Mivart, "the hap-hazard, result." It is in the intimate and 
comparatively minute parts of the organic world in individual 
structures or organisms that the beautiful and wonderful order 
is seen. When we look at great groups, like the floras and 
faunas of various regions, or at past geological groupings, — the 
shifting clouds, as it were, of organic life, — this order disap- 
pears or is hidden for the most part. There remains enough 
of apparent order to indicate continuity in time and space, but 
hardly anything more. Perfectly as the individual organism 
may exhibit adaptations or the applications of principles of 
utility, there is no definite clew in it to the cause of the partic- 
ular combination of uses which it embodies, or to its exist- 
ence in a particular region, or at a particular period in the his- 
tory of the world, or to its co-existence with many other quite 
independent particular forms. But in precise analogy with 
what is conspicuously regular and indicative of simple laws in 
the organic world, correspond the intimate elementary changes 
of the atmosphere, some of which, like the fall and even the 
formation of rain and snow, the development and disappear- 
ance of clouds, are almost as simple exhibitions of natural 



E VOL UTION BY NA TURAL SELE CTION. 



179 



laws as experiments in the laboratory. What, even in the 
laboratory, can exceed the beauty, simplicity, and complete- 
ness of that exemplification of definite physical laws which 
the fall of dew on clear, calm nights demonstrates ? More- 
over, there are in the successions of changes in the weather 
sufficient traces of order to indicate a continuity in space and 
time corresponding to the geographical distributions and geo- 
logical successions of the organic world. The elementary or- 
ders, which exhibit ultimate physical laws in simple isolation, 
are, in their aggregate and complex combination, the causes of 
the successions of changes in the weather and the source of 
whatever traces of order appear in them, and are thus analo- 
gous to what the theory of natural selection supposes in the 
organic world, namely, that the adaptations, or the exhibitions 
of simple principles of utility in structures, are in their aggre- 
gate and complex combinations the causes of successive and 
continuous changes in forms of life. 

Far more important, however, than such analogies in the 
doctrine of evolution is the clear understanding of what the 
theory of natural selection undertakes to explain, and what 
is the precise and essential nature of its supposed action. 
There appears to be much confusion on this subject, arising 
probably from the influence of preconceived opinions concern- 
ing the nature both of the matters explained and the mode of 
explanation, or, in other words, concerning the nature of the 
changes which take place in species and the relations of them 
to this cause. These would seem, at first sight, very simple 
matters for conception, and difficult only in the evidences and 
the adequacy of the explanation. Such appeared, and still 
appears, to be the opinion of Mr. Mivart. 

Perhaps the best way to make a difficult theory plain is 
the negative one of correcting the misconceptions of it as they 
arise. This is what we attempted in our former review with 
reference to the character of the variations from which nature 
normally and for the most part selects. But new difficulties 
have emerged in Mr. Mivart's later writings which deserve con- 
sideration. In his answer to Professor Huxley, in the January 
number of the "Contemporary Review" (p. 170), he says of 



I So PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

the theory of natural selection, "That the benefit of the indi- 
vidual in the struggle for life was announced as the one deter- 
mining agent, fixing slight beneficial variations into enduring 
characters," for which he thinks it quite incompetent. And 
again, in reply to us (p. 453), he speaks of " The origin, not, 
of course, of slight variations, but of the fixing of these in 
definite lines and grooves"; and this origin, he believes, can- 
not be natural selection. And we believe that his conclusions 
are right! That is, if the more obvious meaning of these 
expressions are their real ones. They appear to mean that 
natural selection will not account for the unvarying continu- 
ance in succeeding generations of simple changes made acci- 
dentally in individual structures (whether the change be large 
or small), or will not account for the direct conversion of a 
simple change in a parent into a permanent alteration of its 
offspring. Such is the apparent meaning of these expressions, 
but they might possibly be taken as loose expressions of the 
opinion that this cause will not account for permanent changes 
in the average characters, or mid-points, about which variations 
oscillate.; and, in this case, we believe that he is wrong. This 
permanency must not be understood, however, as meaning 
that changes cease, but only that they are not reversed. The 
same cause, natural selection, prevents such reversion, on 
the whole, and except in individual cases which it extermi- 
nates. 

The first and obviously intended meaning of these expres- 
sions has let in light upon the author's own theory and his gen- 
eral difficulty about the theory of natural selection, which we 
did not have before. They show how fundamentally the mat- 
ter has been misconceived, either by him or by us. That we 
did not more fully perceive this fundamental difference doubt- 
less arose from a tacit assumption of the principle of "specific 
stability " in his earlier criticisms, which was explicitly treated 
of in a later chapter and as a subordinate topic. This, as we 
shall find, is the source of the most serious misunderstanding. 
We were not aware that any one supposed that particular varia- 
tions ever became fixed and heritable changes in the characters 
of organisms by the direct agency of natural selection, or, in- 



EVOLUTION BY NATURAL SELECTION. j8i 

deed, by any other known cause. The proper effect of this 
cause is not to fix variations, though it must determine their 
averages and limit their range, and must act directly to in- 
crease the useful ones and diminish the injurious; or rather 
to permit the one and forbid the other, and when these are 
directly opposed to each other, it must act to shift the aver- 
age or normal character, instead of fixing it. Variation 
as a constant and normal phenomenon of organization, ex- 
hibited chiefly in the ranges of individual differences, is, as 
it were, the agitation or irregular oscillation that keeps the 
characters of species from getting too closely fixed in "definite 
lines and grooves," through the too rigid inheritance of ances- 
tral traits ; or it is a principle of alertness that keeps them ever 
ready for movement and change in conformity to changing con- 
ditions of existence. What fixes species (when they are fixed) 
is the continuance of the same advantages in their structures 
and habits, or the same conditions for the action of selection, 
together with the force of long-continued inheritance. 

This, though almost trite from frequent repetition, appears a 
very difficult conception for many minds, probably on account 
of their retaining the old stand-point of philosophy. It would 
appear that Mr. Mivart is really speaking of the fixed species of 
the old and still prevalent philosophy, or about real species, as 
they are commonly called. Natural selection cannot, of course, 
account for these figments. Their true explanation is in the fact 
that naturalists formerly assumed, without proper evidence, that 
a change too slow for them to perceive directly could not exist, 
and that characters widely prevalent and so far advanced as to 
become permanently adapted to very general and unchanging 
conditions of existence, like vertebral and articulate structures, 
the numbers and positions of the organs of locomotion in vari- 
ous animals, the whorl and the spiral arrangement of leaves 
in plants, and similar homological resemblances, could never 
have been vacillating and uncertain ones. It was not many 
years ago that a distinguished writer in criticising the views of 
Lamarck affirmed that "the majority of naturalists agree with 
Linnaeus in supposing that all the individuals propagated from 
one stock have certain distinguishing characters in common, 



1 82 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

which never vary, and which have remained the same since the 
creation of each species." The influence of this opinion still re- 
mains, even with naturalists who would hesitate to assert cate- 
gorically the opinion itself. This comes, doubtless, from the 
fact that long-prevalent doctrines often get stamped into the 
very meanings of words, and thus acquire the character of 
axioms. The word "species" became synonymous with real 
ox fixed species, or these adjectives became pleonastic. And 
this was from the mere force of repetition, and without valid 
foundation in fact, or confirmation from proper inductive evi- 
dence. 

Natural selection does not, of course, account for a fixity 
that does not exist, but only for the adaptations and the diver- 
sities in species, which may or may not be changing at any 
time. They are fixed only as the "fixed" stars are fixed, of 
which very many are now known to be slowly moving. Their 
fixity, when they are fixed, is temporary and through the acci- 
dent of unchanging external conditions. Such is at least the as- 
sumption of the theory of natural selection. Mr. Mivart's the- 
ory seems to assume, on the other hand, that unless a species 
or a character is tied to something it will run away; that there 
is a necessity for some internal bond to hold it, at least tempo- 
rarily, or so long as it remains the same species. He is enti- 
tled, it is true, to challenge the theory of natural selection for 
proofs of its assumption, that "fixity" is not an essential feature 
of natural species ; for, in fact, so far as direct evidence is con- 
cerned, this is an open question. Its decision must depend 
chiefly on the preponderance of indirect and probable evi- 
dences in the interpretation of the "geological record," a sub- 
ject to which much space is devoted, in accordance with its 
importance, in the " Origin of Species." Technical questions 
in the classification and description of species afford other evi- 
dences, and it is asserted by naturalists that a very large num- 
ber of specimens, say ten thousand, is sufficient, in some de- 
partments of natural history, to break down any definition or 
discrimination even of living species. Other evidences are 
afforded by the phenomena of variation under domestication. 
Mr. Mivart had the right, and may still have it, to resist all 



E VOL UTION B Y NA TURA L SELECTION. Y 8 3 

this evidence, as not conclusive; but he is not entitled to call 
upon the theory of natural selection for an explanation of a 
feature in organic structures which the theory denies in its very 
elements, the fixity of species. This is what he has done, — 
implicitly, as it now appears, in his book, and explicitly in his 
later writings. 

The question of zoological philosophy, "Whether species 
have a real existence in nature/' in the decision of which nat- 
uralists have so generally agreed with Linnaeus, refers directly 
and explicitly to this question or the fixity of essential charac- 
ters, and to the assumption that species must remain unaltered 
in these respects so long as they continue to exist, or until they 
give birth to new species ; or, as was formerly believed, give 
place in perishing to new independent creations. The distinc- 
tion involved in this question in the word real should not be 
confounded, as it might easily be, with the distinction in Logic 
of "real kinds" from other class-names. Logic recognizes, a 
principal division in class-names, according as these are the 
names of objects which agree with each other and differ from 
other objects in a very large and indefinite number of particulars 
or attributes, or are the names of objects which agree only in a 
{<i\n and a definite number of attributes. The former are the 
names of "real kinds," and include the names of natural species, 
as man, horse, etc., and of natural genera, as whale, oak, etc. 
These classes are "real kinds," not because the innumerable 
particulars in which the individual members of them agree with 
each other and differ from the members of other classes, are 
themselves fixed or invariable in time, but because this sort of 
agreement and difference is fixed or continues to appear. An 
individual hipparion resembled its immediate parents and the 
other offspring of them as closely as, or, at least, in the same in- 
timate manner in which one horse resembles another, namely, 
in innumerable details. But this is not opposed to the concep- 
tion that the horse is descended from the hipparion by insensi- 
ble steps of gradation or continuously. For examples of names 
that are not the names of "real kinds," we may instance such as 
denominate objects that are an inch in length, or in breadth, or 
are colored black, or are square, or (combining these particu- 



^4 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

Jars) that are as black square inches. These objects may be 
made of paper, or wood, or ivory, Or differ in all other respects 
except the enumerated and definite particulars. They are not 
"real" or natural "kinds," but factitious ones. 

The confusion which, as we have said, might arise between 
the "real kinds" of Logic, and the real species of biological 
speculation, would depend on a vagueness in the significance 
of the word "real," which in common usage combines in un- 
certain proportions two elementary and more precise ideas, 
that of fixedness and that of breadth of relationship. Both 
these marks of reality are applied habitually as tests of it. 
Thus if an object attests its existence to several of my senses, 
is seen, heard, touched, and is varied in its relations to these 
senses, and moreover is similarly related to the senses of an- 
other person, as evinced by his testimony, then I know that 
the object is real, and not a mere hallucination or invention of 
my fantasy; though it may disappear immediately afterwards 
in an unexplained manner, or be removed by some unknown 
but supposable agency. Here the judgment of reality de- 
pends on breadth of relationship to my experience and sources 
of knowledge. Or again I may only see the object, and con- 
sult no other eyes than my own; but seeing it often, day after 
day, in the same place, I shall judge it to be a real object, pro- 
vided its existence is conformable to the general possibilities of 
experience, or to the test of " breadth." Here the test of real- 
ity is "fixity" or continuance in time. That natural species 
are real in one of these senses, that individuals of a species 
are alike in an indefinite number of particulars, and resemble 
each other intimately, is unquestionable as a fact, and is not 
an invention of the understanding or classifying faculty, and is 
moreover the direct natural consequence of the principles of 
inheritance. In this sense species are equivalent to large nat- 
ural stocks or races existing for a limited but indeterminate 
number of generations. That they are real in the other sense, 
or fixed in time absolutely in respect to any of the particulars 
of their resemblance, whether these are essential (that is, useful 
for discrimination and classification) or are not, is far from be- 
in e the axiom it has seemed to be. It is, on the contrary, highly 



E VOL UTION B Y NA TURA L SELEC TION. ^5 

improbable that they are so, though this is tacitly assumed, as 
we have seen, in criticisms" of the theory of natural selection, 
and in the significance often attached to the word "species" in 
which the notions of fixedness and distinctiveness have coa- 
lesced. It is true that without this significance in the word 
"species" the names and descriptions of organic forms could 
not be permanently applicable. No system of classification, 
however natural or real, could be final. Classification would, 
indeed, be wholly inadequate as a representation of the organic 
world on the whole, or as a sketch of the "plan of creation," 
and would be falsely conceived as revealing the categories and 
thoughts of creative intelligence, — a consequence by no means 
welcome to the devout naturalist, since it seems to degrade the 
value of his work. But this may be because he has miscon- 
ceived its true value, and dedicated to the science of divinity 
what is really the rightful inheritance of natural or physical 
science. 

If instead of implicitly assuming the principle of specific 
stability in the earlier chapters of his book, and deferring 
the explicit consideration of it to a later chapter and as a 
special topic, Mr. Mivart had undertaken the establishment 
of it as the essential basis of his theory (as indeed it really 
is), he would have attacked the theory of natural selection 
in a most vital point; and if he had succeeded, all further 
criticism of the theory would have been superfluous. But with- 
out success in establishing this essential basis, he leaves his 
own theory, and his general difficulties concerning the theory 
of natural selection, without adequate foundation. The impor- 
tance of natural selection in the evolution of organic species 
(its predominent influence) depends entirely on the truth of the 
opposite assumption, the instability of species. The evidences 
for and against this position are various, and are not adequate- 
ly considered in the author's chapter on this subject. More- 
over, some of the evidences may be expected to be greatly 
affected by what will doubtless be the discoveries of the imme- 
diate future. Already the difficulties of discrimination and 
classification in dealing with large collections have become 
very great in some departments of natural history, and even in 



I %6 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

paleontology the gradations of fossil forms are becoming finer 
and finer with almost every new discovery; and this in spite 
of the fact that nothing at all approaching to evidence of 
continuity can rationally be expected from the fragment- 
ary geological record. To this evidence must be added 
the phenomena of variation under domestication. The ap- 
parent limits of the changes which can be effected by artificial 
selection are not, as they have been thought, proofs of the doc- 
trine of "specific stability," or of the opinion of Linnaeus, but 
only indications of the dependence of variation on physiolog- 
ical causes, and on laws of inheritance; and also of the fact 
that the laws of variation and the action of natural selection 
are not suspended by domestication, but may oppose the aims 
and efforts of artificial selection. The real point of the proof 
afforded by these phenomena is that permanent changes may 
be effected in species by insensible degrees. They are perma- 
nent, however, only in the sense that no tendency to reversion 
will restore the original form, except by the action of similar 
causes. 

Against the conclusions of such inductive evidences the 
vague analogies of the organic to the inorganic world would 
avail little or nothing, even if they were true. They avail little 
or nothing, consequently, in confirmation of them in being 
proved false ; as we showed one analogy to be in the illustra- 
tion given by our author, namely, the supposed analogy of 
specific characters in crystals to those of organisms ; and his 
inference of abrupt changes in organic species, corresponding 
by this analogy to changes in the mode or species of crystalli- 
zation, which the same substance undergoes in some cases with 
a change of surrounding conditions, such as certain other sub- 
stances may introduce by their presence. A complete illustra- 
tion of the chemical phenomenon is afforded by the crystals of 
sulphur. Crystals produced in the wet way, or from solution 
in the bisulphide of carbon, are of a species entirely distinct 
from those formed in the dry way, or from the fused mineral ; 
and there are many other cases of these phenomena of dimor- 
phism and polymorphism, as they are called. We recur to 
this topic, not on account of its importance to the discussion, 



E VOL UTION B Y NA TURAL SELECTION. 187 

but because Mr. Mivart accuses us of changing a quotation 
from Mr. J. J. Murphy, so that he "is unlucky enough to be 
blamed for what he never said, or apparently thought of say- 
ing." We have looked with true solicitude for the evidences 
of the truth of this charge, and find them to be as follows : 
We transcribed from Mr. Mivart's book these sentences, as 
quoted by him (p. 185), from Mr. Murphy: "It needs no 
proof that in the case of spheres and crystals, the forms and 
the structures are the effect, and not the cause, of the formative 
principles'. Attraction, whether gravitative or capillary, pro- 
duces the spherical form ; the spherical form does not produce 
attraction. And crystalline polarities produce crystalline struct- 
ure and form ; crystalline structure and form do not produce 
crystalline polarities." The superfluous letter and words, which 
we have put in italics, were omitted in the printing, we do not 
know how, but it looks like an unwarrantable attempt in a 
final revision of proofs to improve the English of the quotation. 
Certainly the changes were of no advantage to our criticism, 
especially as they only have the effect to render the antithesis, 
which was the object of the criticism, slightly weaker. It is 
impossible to see how these changes have exposed Mr. Murphy 
to undeserved censure. We blamed him and Mr. Mivart, not 
for the use of abstractions as causes, — a use, which, as Mr. 
Mivart says, we ourselves make whenever it is convenient, but 
for asserting the antithesis of cause and effect between abstrac- 
tions both of which are descriptive of effects, namely, the 
character of the attractions, gravitative and capillary, which 
produce spherical forms vs. the spherical form itself; and the 
polar character of the forces that produce crystals vs. the crys- 
talline form and structure. Each of these effects (both. in the 
case of the sphere and of the crystal) is doubtless a concause 
or condition that goes to the determination of the other. The 
spherical form arranges and determines the resultants of the 
elementary forces, and thus indirectly determines itself, or de- 
termines that action of the elementary forces thus combined, 
which results in the maintenance or stable equilibrium of the 
spherical form. Again, in crystallization the already formed 
bodies, with the particular directions of their faces and axes, 



1 88 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

determine in part how the resultants of elementary polar 
forces will act in the further growth of the crystal, or in the 
repair of a broken one ; and the elementary forces, thus de- 
termined and combined, result in the crystalline form and 
structure. Thus both of the effects which are put in the antith- 
esis of cause and effect in the above quotation are also partial 
agents. They act and react on each other in the production 
of actual crystals. 

But this point was of importance to the discussion only as 
exhibiting a kind of "realism" by which scientific discussion 
is very liable to be confused. In this case, the wordy profun- 
dity was not quite so bald and conspicuous as the ordinary put- 
ting of a single-worded abstract description of an effect for its 
cause, since it consisted in putting one of two such abstractions 
as the cause of the other. More important, as affecting the 
truth of the supposed analogy of species in crystals to those of 
organisms, was our statement which Mr. Mivart confesses is ut- 
terly beyond him, and which, as he certainly has misinterpreted 
it, we may be pardoned for repeating and explaining. We said, 
" Moreover, in the case of crystals, neither these forces [the 
elementary] nor the abstract law of their action in producing 
definite angles reside in the finished bodies, but in the proper- 
ties of the surrounding media, portions of whose constituents 
are changed into crystals, according to these properties and 
other conditioning circumstances." Our author has made us 
say "crystals" where we said "angles," though the unintelli- 
gible character of the sentence ought to have made him the 
more cautious in copying it. We said "angles" because these 
are prominent marks of the species of the crystal; and this spe- 
cies we referred to the nature of the fluid material out of which 
the crystal is formed, and to the modifying influences of the 
presence of other substances, when the crystallization takes 
place from solutions, or in the wet way. The fact that the 
determination of the species of a crystal is not in any germ or 
nucleus or anything belonging in a special way to the partic- 
ular crystal itself, but is in the molecular forces of the fluid so- 
lution, makes the analogy of species in crystals to those of or- 
ganisms not only vague but false. What is really effected by 



EVOLUTION BY NA TURAL SELECTION. 189 

the introduction of a foreign substance, acid or alkali, in the 
solution, is a change, not in such accidents as the surrounding 
conditions are to an organism, but is a change of the essential 
forces, which ought to change the character or species of the 
crystal suddenly, discretely, or discontinuously; and it has not, 
therefore, the remotest likeness to such suppositions as that a 
duck might be hatched from a goose's egg, or a goose from a 
duck's; or that a horse might have been the foal of an hip- 
parion. 

Notwithstanding that our statement was "utterly beyond" 
our author, he has ventured the following confident comments 
(p. 460): "If this is so," he says, "then when a broken crystal 
completes itself, the determining forces reside exclusively in the 
media, and not at all in the crystal with its broken surface! 
The first atoms of a crystal deposited arrange themselves en- 
tirely according to the forces of the surrounding media, and 
their own properties are utterly without influence or effect in 
the result!" The marks of exclamation appended to these 
statements ought to have been ours, since nothing in the state- 
ments themselves has the remotest dependence on anything we 
said; but on the contrary these statements are directly opposed 
to the objections we made to Mr. Murphy's antitheses. They 
might be deducible, perhaps, from our proposition, in the form 
to which it was altered through the substitution of the word 
"crystals" for "angles," by supposing the concrete actual crys- 
tals to be referred to, instead of their species, of which these 
angles are prominent marks. But we had insisted that neither 
the resulting form, nor the resultants of elementary forces, are 
exclusively effects, or exclusively causes in the formation or in 
the mending of actual crystals; yet the species of the crystal is 
fully determined by what is outside of it, or by causes that may 
be abruptly changed by a change in the medium. Hence the 
phenomena of dimorphism and polymorphism, and similar 
chemical phenomena, have nothing in common with the hy- 
pothesis of "specific genesis." 

Several similar misunderstandings of more special criticisms 
in our review tempt us (chiefly from personal considerations) 
to undertake their rectification; but our object in this article 



i 9 o PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

is only to further the discussion, so far as it can be done under 
the inconvenient form of polemical discussion, by removing 
confusions and misunderstandings in essential matters. Hence 
we shall not dwell upon the discussion of what may be called 
hypotheses of the second degree, or hypothetical illustrations 
of the action of natural selection. It was a part of Mr. Mi- 
vart's plan, in attacking the hypothesis of the predominant 
agency of natural selection in the origination of species, to dis- 
credit a number of subordinate hypotheses, as well as to chal- 
lenge the theory to offer any adequate ones for the explanation 
of certain extraordinary structures. We considered in detail 
several objections of this sort, though we might have been 
content with simply pointing out a sufficient answer in the log- 
ical weakness of such a mode of attack. The illustrations of 
the theory which have been proposed have not in general at all 
the force. of arguments; they have it only where the utility of 
a structure is simple and obvious and can be shown by direct 
evidence to be effective in developing the structure out of acci- 
dental beginnings, and even in perfecting it, as in cases of the 
mimicry of certain insects, for the sake of a protection, which 
is thus really acquired. In general, the illustrations serve only- 
to show the mode of action . supposed in the theory, without 
pretending to reconstruct the past history of an animal, even 
by the roughest sketch; or to determine all 77 the uses of any 
structure, or their relative importance. 

To discredit these particular secondary hypotheses has no 
more weight as an argument against the theory than the hy- 
potheses themselves have in confirmation of it. To be con- 
vinced on general grounds that such a structure as that of 
the giraffe's neck was developed by insensible steps from a 
more common form of the neck in Ungulates, through the oscil- 
lations of individual differences, and by the special utilities of 
the variations which have made the neck longer in some indi- 
viduals than in others, or through the utilities of these to the 
animals under the special conditions of their past existence, is 
very different from believing that this or that particular use in 
the structure was the utility (to adopt our author's favorite 
form of definiteness) which governed the selection or deter- 



E VOL UTION B Y NA TURAL SELECTION. 



I 9 I 



mined the survival of the fittest. The use which may be pre- 
sumed in general to govern selection is a combination, with 
various degrees of importance, of all the actual uses in a struct- 
ure. There can be no more propriety in demanding of the 
theory of natural selection that it should assign a special use, or 
trace out the history hypothetically of any particular structure 
in its relations to past conditions of existence, than there would 
be in demanding of political economy that it should justify the 
correctness of its general principles by success in explaining 
the record of past prices in detail, or accounting in particular 
for a given financial anomaly. In either case, the proper evi- 
dence is wanting. Any instance, however, of a structure which 
could be conclusively shown (a very difficult kind of proof) to 
exist, or to be developed in any way, without reference in the 
process of development to any utility whatever, past or present, 
or to any past forms of the structure, would, indeed, go far 
towards qualifying the evidence, otherwise mostly affirmative, 
of the predominant agency of natural selection. 

We may remark by the way that Mr. Mi van's definite thesis, 
"that natural selection is not the origin of species," is really 
not the question. No more was ever claimed for it than that 
it is the most influential of the agencies through which species 
have been modified. Lamarck's principle of the direct effect 
of habit, or actual use and disuse, has never been abandoned 
by later evolutionists; and Mr. Darwin has given much more 
attention to its proof and illustration in his work on " Variation 
under Domestication" than any other writer. Moreover, the 
physiological causes which produce reversions and correlations 
of growth, and which, so far as they are known, are quite inde- 
pendent of natural selection, are also recognized as causes of 
change. But all these are subordinated in the theory to the 
advantage and consequent survival of the fittest in the struggle 
for life, or to natural selection. Upon this point we must refer 
our readers to the "Additions and Corrections" in the lately 
published sixth edition of the "Origin of Species"; in which 
also all the objections brought forward by Mr. Mivart, which 
had not previously been examined in the work, are fully con- 
sidered; and, we need hardly add, far more thoroughly and 



ig 2 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

adequately than could be possible for us, or in the pages of 
this Review. 

We will, nevertheless, give, in sheer self-defense, the correc- 
tion of one perversion of our criticism. Mr. Mivart had argued 
in his book that the use of the giraffe's long neck for browsing 
on the foliage of trees, and the advantage of it in times of 
drought, could not be the cause of its gradual increase by se- 
lection ; since this advantage, if a real one, would be equally 
an advantage to all Ungulates inhabiting the country of the 
giraffe, or similar regions; and that the other Ungulates, at 
least in such regions, ought to have been similarly modified. 
We allowed that there was force in the objection, but we were 
mistaken. The very conditions of the selection must have 
been a competition which would have soon put a large major-, 
ity of the competitors out of the lists, and have narrowed the 
contest to a few races, and finally to the individuals of a. single 
race. All the rest must have early given up the struggle for 
life in this direction; since a slight increase in the length of 
the neck could have been of no advantage if the reach of it 
still fell far short of the unconsumed foliage. The success of 
the survivors among them must have been won in some other 
direction, like the power of rapid and wide ranging, or organs 
better adapted to close grazing. For a fuller development and 
illustration of this reply we must refer to Chapter VII. in the 
new edition of the " Origin of Species," in which most of Mr. 
Mivart's objections are considered. We attempted a reply to 
this objection in a direction in which his own remarks led us. 
Granting that the advantage of a long neck would have been 
equally an advantage to all Ungulates in South Africa; that 
there was no alternative or substitute for it; and that the use 
of the neck for high reaching in times of drought could not 
therefore have been the efficient cause of its preservation and 
increase through selection; still there were other and very im- 
portant uses in such a neck, to which these objections do not 
apply, and through which there would be advantages in the 
struggle for life, that would determine competition only among 
the individuals of a single race; while those of other races 
would compete with each other on other grounds. Mr. Mivart 



E VOL UTION BY NA TURAL SELECTION. 



193 



admitted that there might be several lines of advantage in 
means of protection or defense; and cited instances from Mr. 
Wallace, showing, for example, that a dull color, useful for con- 
cealing an animal, would not be an advantage to those animals 
which are otherwise sufficiently protected, and do not need 
concealment. The use of the giraffe's neck, then, as a means 
of defense and offense, for which there was ample evidence, its 
use as a watch-tower and as a weapon of offense, would be 
raised by Mr. Mivart's objection to greater prominence, and 
might be the principal ground of advantage and competition 
between giraffe and giraffe, or one herd of them and another, 
with reference to protecticn from the larger beasts of prey; an 
advantage which would be incessant instead of occasional, like 
the high-reaching advantage in times of drought. The use, as 
we have said, means, with reference to the advantage in the 
struggle for life, the combination of all the uses that are of 
importance to the preservation of life. Accordingly we de- 
manded whether Mr. Mivart, having made a special objection 
to the importance of one use, as affording advantages and 
grounds for selection (an objection which we allowed, though 
unwarrantably), we demanded whether he could possibly sup- 
pose that this exhausted the matter, or that the supposed small 
importance of this use precluded the existence of uses more 
important which would afford grounds of advantage and com- 
petition in the struggle for life. 

As would be the case with one having the true "philosophical 
habit of mind," to be distinguished from the "scientific/' Mr. 
Mivart's notice was attracted to the form in which we made this 
inquiry, rather than to the material import of it, and "as we 
might a priori expect to be the case," he showed " that breadth 
of view, freedom of handling, and flexibility of mind" which 
he believes to characterize the true philosopher, as contrasted 
with the mere physicist; but in a manner which appears to us 
to characterize rather the mere dialectician. With great fer- 
tility of invention he attempts the interpretation of our inquiry 
(which we grant was not sufficiently explicit for the "philo- 
sophical habit of mind "). The first interpretation is playful, 
and too delicate a jest to be transplanted to our pages. The 



1 94 



PHIL OSOPHICA L DISC US S IONS. 



next is, on the other hand, altogether too serious. He asks 
in return (p. 463), whether we can suppose "that he ever 
dreamed that the structures of animals are not useful to them, 
or that his position is an altogether anti-teleological one." No, 
we certainly do not. We only suppose that his position is not 
sufficiently teleological to interest him in the inquiry, and that 
he has overlooked many uses in the structures of animals, to 
which his special objections do not apply, and has vainly im- 
agined, that by making those he felt called upon to examine 
as few and as faint as possible (except for the purpose of 
inspiring the agreeable emotion of admiration), he has re- 
duced them to mere luxuries, having little or no value as 
grounds of advantage in the actual, incessant, and severe 
struggle to which all life is subject. "Nothing is easier than 
to admit in words the truth of the universal struggle for life, 
or more difficult" — even Mr. Darwin finds it so — "than con- 
stantly to bear this conclusion in mind. Yet unless it be 
thoroughly engrained in the mind, the whole economy of na- 
ture, with every fact in distribution, rarity, abundance, extinc- 
tion, and variation, will be dimly seen or quite misunderstood." 
Supposing us possessed by some such idea as that his "posi- 
tion is an altogether anti-teleological one," Mr. Mivart observes 
that we proceed "to exhibit the giraffe's neck in the character 
of a 'watch-tower.' But," he adds, "this leaves the question 
just where it was before. Of course I concede most readily 
and fully that it is. a most admirable watch-tower, as it also is 
a most admirable high-reaching organ, but this tells us nothing 
of its origifi. In both cases the long neck is most useful when 
you have got it ; but the question is how it arose, and in this 
species alone. And similar and as convincing arguments 
could be brought against the watch-tower theory of origin as 
against the high-reaching theory, and not only this, but also 
against every other theory which could possibly be adduced." 
It appears that Mr. Mivart is prepared, a prion, to meet any 
number of foes of this sort that may present themselves singly. 
But the use, that is, all the essential uses of a structure, do not 
thus present themselves to our consideration and criticism. To 
deal adequately with the problem, we need the power to con- 



E VOL UTJON BY NA TURA L SELECTION. i g 5 

ceive how closely the uses lie to the actual necessities of life; 
how, while we may be admiring in imagination the almost su- 
perfluous bounties of nature, this admirable watch-tower and 
high-reaching organ may just be failing to save the poor ani- 
mal, so highly endowed, from a miserable death. A lion, 
whose stealthy approach it would have detected, if a few inches 
more in the length of its neck, or in those of its companions, 
had enabled it, or them, to see a few rods further, or over some 
intervening obstacle, has meantime sprung upon the wretched 
beast, and is drawing its life-blood. This, if we were aware of 
it, would be the proper occasion to turn our admiration upon 
the fine endowments of the lion. Or, continuing our contem- 
plation of the giraffe, it may be that its admirable high-reach- 
ing organ has just failed to reach the few remaining leaves 
near the tops of trees, which might have served to keep up its 
strength against the attacks of its enemies, or enabled it to 
deal more effective blows with its short horns, so admirably 
placed as weapons of offense; or might have served to sustain 
it through the famine and drought, till the returning rains 
would have given it more cause for gratitude (and us more 
occasion for admiration), for a few additional inches of its 
neck than for all the rest. Meantime, for the lack of these 
inches, our giraffe may have sickened and perished miserably, 
failing in the competition and struggle for life. This need not 
stagger the optimist. The bounty of nature is not exhausted 
in giraffes. We can still admire the providential structure of 
the tree, which by its high-reaching branches has preserved 
some of its foliage from destruction by these beasts, and per- 
haps thereby saved not only its own life, but that of its kind. 
The occasions of destruction, even in the best guarded, most 
highly endowed lives, are all of the nature of accidents, and 
are generally as slight as the individual advantages are, for 
which so much influence is claimed in the theory of natural 
selection. Even death from old age is not a termination pre- 
ordained in the original powers of any life, but is the effect of 
accumulated causes of this sort. Much of the destruction to 
which life is subject* is strictly fortuitous so far as either the 

* The fortuity or chance is here, as in all other cases, a relative fact. The strictest 
use of the word applies to events which could not be anticipated except by omnis- 



I9 6 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

general powers or individual advantages in structures and 
habits are concerned; and is, therefore, quite independent of 
the effects of these advantages. Hence these effects are not 
thereby limited; for though a form of life presses, and is 
pressed upon, in all directions, yet it presses forward no less 
in the directions of its advantages. 

The "philosophical habit of mind," which Mr. Mivart admires 
for its " breadth of view, freedom of handling, and flexibility of 
mind," is sometimes optimistic, sometimes pessimistic in its 
views of providence in nature, according as this flexible mind 
has its attention bent by a genial or morose disposition to a 
bright or dark aspect in things. But, whichever it is, it is 
generally extreme or absolute in its judgments. The " scien- 
tific" mind, which Mr. Mivart contrasts with it, and believes 
to be characterized by "a certain rigidity and narrowness," is 
held rigidly to the truth of things, whether good or bad, agree- 
able or disagreeable, admirable or despicable, and is narrowed 
to the closest, most uncompromising study of facts, and to a 
training which enables it to render in imagination the truest 
account of nature as it actually exists. The " scientific " imagi- 
nation is fashioned by physical studies after the patterns of 
nature itself. The "philosophical habit of mind," trained in 
the school of human life, is the habit of viewing and interpret- 
ing nature according to its own dispositions, and defending its 
interpretations and attacking others with the skill and weapons 
of forensic and dialectical discussions. The earlier physical 
philosophers, the "physicists" of the ancient school, were 
"philosophers" in our author's sense of the term. They had 
not the " scientific " mind, since to them nature was a chaos 

cience. To speak, therefore, of an event as strictly accidental is not equivalent to regard- 
ing it as undetermined, but only as determined in a manner which cannot be anticipated 
by a finite intelligence (see Mr. Mivart's Reply, p. 458). There are degrees in the in- 
telligibility of things, according to human means and standards. Events like eclipses, 
which are the most normal and predictable of all events to the astronomer, are to the 
savage pure accidents; and with still lower forms of intelligence events are unforeseen 
which are familiar anticipations in the intelligence of the savage. To believe events to 
be designed or not, according as they are or are not predictable by us, is to assume for 
ourselves a complete and absolute knowledge of nature which we do not possess. Hence 
faith in a designing intelligence, supreme in nature, is not the result of any capacity in 
our own intelligence to comprehend the design, and is quite independent of any dis- 
tinctions we may make, relative to our own powers of prediction, between orderly and 
accidental events. 



V 



E VOL UTION BY NA TURAL SELECTION. jyj 

hardly less confused than human affairs, and was studied with 
the same "breadth of view, freedom of handling, and flexibility 
of mind" which are fitted for and disciplined by such affairs. 
They were wise rather than well informed. Their observation 
was guided by tact and subtilty, or fine powers of discrimination, 
instead of by that machinery of knowledge and the arts which 
now fashions and guides the "scientific" mind. Thus the the- 
ory of atoms of Democritus has little resemblance to the chem- 
ical theory of atoms, since "the modern theory is the law of 
definite proportions ; the ancient theory is merely the affirma- 
tion of indefinite combinations." Indefinite, or at least inexpli- 
cable, combinations meet the modern student of science, both 
physical and social, at every step of his researches, and in all 
the sciences with which we have compared the theory of natu- 
ral selection. He does not stop to lay hold upon these a 
priori, with the loose though flexible grasp of the "philosophical 
habit of mind," but studies the intimate and elementary 
orders in them, and presumes them to be made up of such or- 
ders, though woven in infinite and inexplicable complexity of 
pattern. 

The division which Mr. Mivart makes in kinds of intellectual 
ability, the " philosophical " and " scientific," and regards as a 
more real distinction than the threefold division we proposed,* 
is really determined by a broad distinction in the object-matter 
of thought and study, and is not in any way inconsistent with 
what we still regard as an equally real but more elementary 
one, which is equivalent in fact to the logical division of "hy- 
pothesis," "simple induction," and "deduction." These are 
not, indeed, co-ordinate as logical elements, since induction and 
deduction exhaust the simple elements of understanding when 
unaided by trained powers of perception and imagination. 
But practically, as habits of thought and disciplined skill in the 
study of nature and human affairs, they are distinct and diver- 
gent modes of investigation, partly determined by the character 
of the problem,— whether it be to explain a fact, or to properly 
name and classify it, or to prove it from assumed or admitted 
premises. Skill in the formation and verification of hypothesis, 

* See ante p. 141 



19 8 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

dependent on a power of imagination, which physical studies 
discipline peculiarly, belongs peculiarly to the student of phys- 
ical science; and though, perhaps, "a poor monster," as Mr. 
Mivart says, when without an adequate basis in more strictly 
inductive studies, yet in that division of labors and abilities, 
on which the economy and efficiency of scientific investigation 
so largely depends, there is no propriety in thus regarding him. 
so long as co-operation in the pursuit of truth produce a sym- 
metrical whole; not, indeed, complete in a single mind, except 
so far as it is erudite or instructed beyond the range of its 
special abilities, but in that solid general progress of science 
which such co-operation promotes. 



EVOLUTION OF SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 

It has come to be understood, and very generally allowed, 
that the conception of the origin of man as an animal race, as 
well as the origin of individual men within it, in accordance 
with the continuity of organic development maintained in the 
theory of evolution, does not involve any very serious difficul- 
ties, or difficulties so great as are presented by any other hy- 
pothesis of this origin, not excepting that of "special creation "; 
— if that can be properly called a hypothesis, which is, in fact, 
a resumption of all the difficuUies of natural explanation, as- 
suming them to be insuperable and summarizing them under a 
single positive name. Yet in this evolution, the birth of self- 
consciousness is still thought by many to be a step not follow- 
ing from antecedent conditions in "nature," except in an in- 
cidental manner, or in so far only as "natural" antecedents 
have prepared the way for the " supernatural " advent of the 
self-conscious soul. 

Independently of the form of expression, and of the false 
sentiment which is the motive of the antithesis in this familiar 
conception, or independently of its mystical interest, which has 
given to the words "natural" and "supernatural" their com- 
monly accepted meanings, there is a foundation of scientific 
truth in the conception. For the word "evolution" conveys a 
false impression to the imagination, not really intended in the 
scientific use of it. It misleads by suggesting a continuity in 
the kinds of powers and functions in living beings, that is, by 
suggesting transition by insensible steps from one kiiid to an- 
other, as well as in the degrees of their importance and exercise 
at different stages of development. The truth is, on the con- 
trary, that according to the theory of evolution, new uses of old 

* From the North American Review, April, 1873. 



200 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

powers arise discontinuously both in the bodily and mental nat- 
ures of the animal, and in its individual developments, as well 
as in the development of its race, although, at their rise, these 
uses arc small and of the smallest importance to life. They seem 
merged in the powers to which they are incident, and seem also 
merged in the special purposes or functions in which, however, 
they really have no part, and which are no parts of them. Their 
services or functions in life, though realized only incidentally 
at first, and in the feeblest degree, are just as distinct as they 
afterwards come to appear in their fullest development. The 
new uses are related to older powers only as accidents, so far as 
the special services of the older powers are concerned, although, 
from the more general point of view of natural law, their rela- 
tions to older uses have not the character of accidents, since 
these relations are, for the most part, determined by universal 
properties and laws, which are not specially related to the needs 
and conditions of living beings. Thus the uses of limbs for 
swimming, crawling, walking, leaping, climbing, and flying are 
distinct uses, and are related to each other only through the 
general mechanical principles of locomotion, through which 
some one use, in its first exercise, may be incident to some other, 
though, in its full exercise and perfection of special service, it is 
independent of the other, or has only a common dependence 
with the other or more general conditions. 

Many mental as well as bodily powers thus have mixed 
natures, or independent uses ; as, for example, the powers of 
the voice to call and allure, to warn and repel, and its uses in 
music and language; or the numerous uses of the human hand 
in services of strength and dexterity. And, on the contrary, 
the same uses are, in some cases, realized by independent or- 
gans as, for example, respiration in water and in the air by gills 
and lungs, or flight by means of fins, feathers, and webs. The 
appearance of a really new power in nature (using this word in 
the wide meaning attached to it in science), the power of flight 
in the first birds, for example, is only involved potentially in 
previous phenomena. In the same way, no act of self-con- 
sciousness, however elementary, may have been realized before 
man's first self-conscious act in the animal world ; vet the act 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CO NSC 10 USNESS. 2 o i 

may have been involved potentially in pre-existing powers or 
causes. The derivation of this power, supposing it to have 
been observed by a finite angelic (not animal) intelligence, 
could not have been foreseen to be involved in the mental 
causes, on the conjunction of which it might, nevertheless, 
have been seen to depend. The angelic observation would 
have been a purely empirical one. . The possibility of a subse- 
quent analysis of these causes by the self-conscious animal 
himself, w^hich would afford an explanation of their agency, 
by referring it to a rational combination of simpler elements in 
them, would not alter the case to the angelic intelligence, just 
as a rational explanation of flight could not be reached by 
such an intelligence as a consequence of known mechanical 
laws"; since these laws are also animal conditions, or rather are 
more general and material ones, of which our angelic, spher- 
ical * intelligence is not supposed to have had any experience. 
Its observation of the conditions of animal flight would thus 
also be empirical ; for an unembodied spirit cannot be supposed 
to analyze out of its general experiences the mechanical con- 
ditions of movement in animal bodies, nor, on the other hand, 
to be any more able than the mystic appears to be to analyze 
the conditions of its own intelligence out of its experiences of 
animal minds. 

The forces and laws of molecular physics are similarly re- 
lated to actual human intelligence. Sub-sensible properties 
and powers can only be empirically known, though they are 
"visualized" in the hypotheses of molecular movements and 
forces. Experimental science, as in chemistry, is full of ex- 
amples of the discovery of new properties or new powers, 
which, so far as the conditions of their appearance were pre- 
viously known, did not follow from antecedent conditions, ex- 
cept in an incidental manner, — that is, in a manner not the?i 
foreseen to be involved in them ; and these effects became 
afterwards predictable from what had become known to be 
their antecedent conditions only by the empirical laws or rules 
which inductive experimentation had established. Neverthe- 

* For an intellect complete without appendages of sense or locomotion, see Plato's 
Tima-us, 33, 34. 



202 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

less, the phenomena of the physical or chemical laboratory, 
however new or unprecedented, are very far from having the 
character of miracles, in the sense of supernatural events. 
They are still natural events ; for, to the scientific imagination, 
nature means more than the continuance or actual repetition 
of the properties and productions involved in the course of 
ordinary events, or more than the inheritance and reappearance 
of that which appears in consequence of powers which have 
made it appear before. It means, in general, those kinds of 
effects which, though they may have appeared but once in the 
whole history of the world, yet appear dependent on conjunc- 
tions of causes which would always be followed by them. 
One experiment is sometimes, in some branches of science, (as 
a wide induction has found it to be in chemistry, for example,) 
sufficient to determine such a dependence, though the particu- 
lar law so determined is a wholly empirical one; and the his- 
tory of science has examples of such single experiments, or 
short series of experiments, made on general principles of ex- 
perimentation, for the purpose of ascertaining empirical facts 
or laws, qualities, or relations, which are, nevertheless, gener- 
alized as universal ones. Certain "physical constants," so 
called, were so determined, and are applied in scientific 
inference with the same unhesitating confidence as that inspired 
by the familiarly exemplified and more elementary " laws of 
nature," or even by axioms. Scientific research implies the 
potential existence of the natures, classes, or kinds of effects 
which experiment brings to light through instances, and for 
which it also determines, in accordance with inductive meth- 
ods, the previously unknown conditions of their appearance. 
This research implies the latent kinds or natures which mystical 
research contemplates (erroneously, in some, at least, of its 
meditations) under the name of "the supernatural." 

To make any event or power supernatural in the mystic's re- 
gard requires, however, not merely that it shall be isolated and 
unparalleled in nature, but that it shall have more than an or- 
dinary, or merely scientific, interest to the mystic's or to the 
human mind. The distinctively human or self-conscious in- 
terest, or sentiment, of self-consciousness gives an emphasis tc 



EVOLUTION OF SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 



203 



the contrast named "natural and supernatural," through which 
mysticism is led to its speculations or assumptions of corre- 
spondingly emphatic contrasts in real existences. For mysti- 
cism is a speculation interpreting as matters of fact, or real ex- 
istences outside of consciousness, impressions which are only 
determined within it by emphasis of attention or feeling. It 
is for the purpose of deepening still more, or to the utmost that 
its interest suggests, the really profound distinction between hu- 
man and animal consciousness, or for the purpose of making 
the distinction absolute, of deepening this gulf into an unfath- 
omable and impassable one, that mysticism appears to be 
moved to its speculations, and has imbued most philosophy 
and polite learning with its conceptions. Mental philosophy, 
or metaphysics, has, consequently, come down to us from 
ancient times least affected by the speculative interests and 
methods of modern science. Mysticism still reigns over the 
science of the mind, though its theory in general, or what 
is common to all theories called mystical, is very vague, and 
obscure even in the exclusively religious applications of the 
term. This vagueness has given rise to the more extended 
use and understanding of the term as it is here employed, 
which indicates little else than the generally apprehended 
motive of its speculations, or the feelings allied to all its 
forms of conception. These centre in the feeling of abso- 
lute worthiness in self-consciousness, as the source, and at the 
same time the perfection of existence and power. The natu- 
ralist's observations on the minds of men and animals are im- 
pertinences of the least possible interest to this sense of worth, 
very much as the geologist's observations are generally to the 
speculator who seeks in the earth for hidden mineral treasures. 
Mysticism in mental philosophy has apparently gained, so 
far as it has been materially affected by such observations, a 
relative external strength, dependent on the real feebleness of 
the opposition it has generally met with from lovers of ani- 
mals and from empirical observers and thinkers, in whom a 
generous sympathy with the manifestations of mind in animals 
and a disposition to do justice to them have been more con- 
spicuous than the qualities of clearness or consistency. For, 



204 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

in the comparisons which they have attempted they have gen- 
erally sought to break down the really well-founded distinctions 
of human and animal intelligence, and have sought to discredit 
the theory of them in this way, rather than by substituting for 
it a rational, scientific account of what is real in them. The 
ultimate metaphysical mystery which denies all comparison, 
and pronounces man a paragon in the kinds, as well the de- 
grees, of his mental faculties, is, as a solution, certainly simpler, 
whatever other scientific excellence it may lack, than any so- 
lution that the difficulties of a true scientific comparison are 
likely to receive. 

It is not in a strictly empirical way that this comparison 
can be clearly and effectively made, but rather by a critical 
re-examination of the phenomena of self-consciousness in 
themselves, with reference to their possible evolution from 
powers obviously common to all animal intelligences, or with 
reference to their potential, though not less natural, exist- 
ence in mental causes, which could not have been known to 
involve them before their actual manifestation, but may, nev- 
ertheless, be found to do so by an analysis of these causes into 
the more general conditions of mental phenomena. Mystical 
metaphysics should be met by scientific inquiries on its own 
ground, that is, dogmatically, or by theory, since it despises 
the facts Of empirical observation, or attributes them to shal- 
lowness, misinterpretation, or errors of observation, and con- 
tents itself with its strength as a system, and its impregnable 
self-consistency. Only an explanation of the phenomena of 
human consciousness, equally clear and self-consistent with its 
own, and Qne which, though not so simple, is yet more in ac- 
cordance with the facts of a wider induction, could equal it in 
strength. But this might still be expected as the result of an 
examination of mental phenomena from the point of view of 
true science; since many modern sciences afford examples of 
similar triumphs over equally ancient, simple, and apparently 
impregnable doctrines. The history of science is full, indeed, 
of illustrations of the impotence, on one hand, of exceptional 
and isolated facts against established theory, and of the power, 
on the other hand, of their organization in new theories to rev- 



EVOLUTION OF SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 



2oq 



olutionize beliefs. The physical doctrine of a plenum, the doc- 
trine of epicycles and vortices in astronomy, the corpuscular 
theory of optics, that of cataclysms in geology, and that of 
special creations in biology, each gave way, not absolutely 
through its intrinsic weakness, but through the greater success 
of a rival theory which superseded it. A sketch only is at- 
tempted in this essay of some of the results of such an exam- 
ination into the psychological conditions, or antecedents, of 
the phenomena of self-consciousness; an examination which 
does not aim at diminishing, on the one hand, the real contrasts 
of mental powers in men and animals, nor at avoiding difficul- 
ties, on the other, by magnifying them beyond the reach of 
comparison. 

The terms "science" and "scientific" have come, in modern 
times, to have so wide a range of application, and so vague a 
meaning, that (like many other terms, not only in common 
speech, but also in philosophy and in various branches of 
learning, which have come down to us through varying usages) 
they would oppose great difficulties to any attempts at de- 
fining them by genus and difference, or otherwise than by 
enumerating the branches of knowledge and the facts, or rela- 
tions of the facts, to which usage has affixed them as names. 
Precision in proper definition being then impossible, it is yet 
possible to give to these terms so general a meaning as to cover 
all the knowledge to which they are usually applied, and still 
to exclude much besides. As the terms thus defined coincide 
with what I propose to show as the character of the knowledge 
peculiar to men, or which distinguishes the minds of men from 
those of other animals, I will begin with this definition. In sci- 
ence and in scientific facts there is implied a conscious purpose 
of including particular facts under general facts, and the less 
general under the more general ones. Science, in the modern 
use of the term, consists, essentially, of a knowledge of things 
and events either as effects of general causes, or as instances of 
general classes, rules, or laws; or even as isolated facts of 
which the class, law, rule, or cause is sought. The conscious 
purpose of arriving at general facts and at an adequate state- 
ment of them in language, or of bringing particular facts undei 



206 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

explicit general ones, determines for any knowledge a scientific 
character. 

Many of our knowledges and judgments from experience in 
practical matters are not so reduced, or sought to be reduced, 
to explicit principles, or have not a theoretical form, since the 
major premises, or general principles, of our judgments are not 
consciously generalized by us in forms of speech. Even mat- 
ters not strictly practical, or which would be merely theoretical 
in their bearing on conduct, if reduced to a scientific form, like 
many of the judgments of common-sense, for example, are not 
consciously referred by us to explicit principles, though derived, 
like science, from experience, and even from special kinds of 
experience, like that of a man of business, or that of a profes- 
sional adept. We are often led by being conscious of a sign of 
anything to believe in the existence of the thing itself, either 
past, present, or prospective, without having any distinct and 
general apprehension of the connection of the sign and thing, 
or any recognition of the sign under the general character of a 
sign. Not only are the judgments of common-sense in men, 
both the inherited and acquired ones, devoid of heads, or major 
premises (such as "All men are mortal"), in deductive infer- 
ence, and devoid also of distinctly remembered details of ex- 
perience in the inferences of induction, but it is highly probable 
that this is all but exclusively the character of the knowledges 
and judgments of the lower animals. Language, strictly so 
called, which some of these animals also have, or signs pw-- 
fiosely used for communication, is not only required for scientific 
knowledge, but a second step of generalization is needed, and is 
made through reflection, by which this use of a sign is itself 
made an object of attention, and the'sign is recognized in its 
general relations to what it signifies, and to what it has signified 
in the past, and will signify in the future. It is highly improba- 
ble that such a knowledge of knowledge, or such a recognition, 
belongs in any considerable, or effective, degree to even the 
most intelligent of the lower animals, or even to the lowest of 
the human race. This is what is properly meant by being "ra- 
tional," or being a " rational animal." It is what I have preferred 
to call "scientific " knowledge; since the growing vagueness and 



EVOLUTION OF SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 



207 



breadth of application common to all ill-comprehended words 
(like "Positivism" in recent times) have given to "scientific" 
the meaning probably attached at first to "rational." This 
knowledge comes from reflecting on what we know in the com- 
mon-sense, or semi-instinctive form, or making what we know a 
field of renewed research, observation, and analysis in the gen- 
eralization of major premises. The line of distinction between 
such results of reflection, or between scientific knowledge and 
the common-sense form of knowledge, is not simply the divid- 
ing line between the minds of men and those of other animals ; 
but is that which divides the knowledge produced by outward 
attention from that which is further produced by reflective at- 
tention. The former, throughout a considerable range of the 
higher intelligent animals, involves veritable judgments of a 
complex sort. It involves combinations of minor premises 
leading to conclusions through implicit major premises in the 
enthymematic reasonings, commonly employed in inferences 
from signs and likelihoods, as in prognostications of the 
weather, or in orientations with many animals. This knowl- 
edge belongs both to men and to the animals next to men in 
intelligence, though in unequal degrees. 

So. far as logicians are correct in regarding an enthymeme as 
a reasoning, independently of its statement in words; or in 
regarding as a rational process the passing from such a sign as 
the human nature of Socrates to the inference that he will 
die, through the data of experience concerning the mortality 
of other men, — data which are neither distinctly remembered 
in detail nor generalized explicitly in the formula, " all men are 
mortal," but are effective only in making mortality a more or 
less clearly understood part of the human nature, that is, in 
making it one of the attributes suggested by the name " man," 
yet not separated from the essential attributes by the contrasts 
of subject and attributes in real predication, — so far, I say, as 
this can be regarded as a reasoning, or a rational process, so 
far observation shows that the more intelligent dumb animals 
reason, or are rational. But this involves great vagueness or 
want of that precision in the use of signs which the antitheses 
of essential and accidental attributes and that of proper pred- 



208 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

ication secure. There is little, or no, evidence to show that 
the animals which learn, to some extent, to comprehend hu- 
man speech have an analytical comprehension of real general 
propositions, or of propositions in which both subject and pred- 
icate are general terms and diner in meaning. A merely ver- 
bal general proposition, declaring only the equivalence of two 
general names, might be comprehended by such minds, if it 
could be made of sufficient interest to attract their attention. 
But this is extremely doubtful, and it would not be as a propo- 
sition, with its contrasts of essential and added elements of con- 
ception that it would be comprehended. It would be, in 
effect, only repeating in succession two general names of the 
same class of objects. Such minds could, doubtless, compre- 
hend a single class of objects, or an indefinite number of re- 
sembling things by several names ; that is, several signs of such 
a class would recall it to their thoughts, or revive a represen- 
tative image of it ; and they would thus be aware of the equiv- 
alence of these signs ; but they would not attach precision of 
meaning and different degrees of generality to them, or regard 
one name as the name or sign of another name ; as when we 
define a triangle to be a rectilinear figure, and a figure of three 
sides. 

Only one degree of generality is, however, essential to infer- 
ence from signs, or in enthymematic reasoning. Moreover, 
language in its relation to thought does not consist exclusively 
of spoken, or written, or imagined words, but of signs in gen- 
eral, and, essentially, of internal images or successions of ima- 
ges, which are the representative imaginations of objects and 
their relations; imaginations which severally stand for each 
and all of the particular objects or relations of a kind. Such 
are the visual imaginations called up by spoken or written con- 
crete general names of visible objects, as "dog" or "tree"; 
which are vague and feeble as images, but effective as notative, 
directive, or guiding elements in thought. These are the in- 
ternal signs of things and events, and are instruments of thought 
in judgment and reasoning, not only with dumb animals but 
also with men, in whom they are supplemented, rather than 
supplanted, by names. But being of feeble intensity, and little 



EVOLUTION OF SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 



209 



under the influence of distinct attention or control of the will, 
compared to actual perceptions and to the voluntary move- 
ments of utterance and gesture, their nature has been but dimly 
understood even by metaphysicians, who are still divided into 
two schools in logic,— the conceptualists and the nominalists. 
The "concepts" of the former are really composed of these 
vague and feeble notative images, or groups of images, to 
which clearness and distinctness of attention are given by their 
associations with outward (usually vocal) signs. Hence a sec- 
ond degree of observation and generalization upon these im- 
ages, as objects in reflective thought, cannot be readily realized 
independently of what would be the results of such observa- 
tions, namely, their associations with outward signs. Even in 
the most intelligent dumb animal they are probably so feeble 
that they cannot be associated with outward signs in such a 
manner as to make these distinctly appear as substitutes, or 
signs equivalent to them. 

So far as images act in governing trains of thought and reason- 
ing, they act as signs; but, with reference to the more vivid out- 
ward signs, they are, in the animal mind, merged in the things 
signified, like stars in the light of the sun. Hence, language, 
in its narrower sense, as the instrument of reflective thought, 
appears to depend directly on the intensity of significant, or 
representative, images; since the power to attend to these and 
intensify them still further, at the same time that an equivalent 
outward sign is an object of attention, would appear to depend 
solely on the relative intensities of the two states, or on the 
relations of intensity in perception and imagination, or in 
original and revived impressions. The direct power of atten- 
tion to intensify a revived impression in imagination does not 
appear to be different in kind from the power of attention in 
perception, or in outward impressions generally. But this 
direct power would be obviously aided by the indirect action of 
attention when fixed by an outward sign, provided attention 
could be directed to both at the same time; as a single glance 
may comprehend in one field of view the moon or the brighter 
planets and the sun, since the moon or planet is not hidden 
like the stars, by the glare of day. 



2io PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

As soon, then, as the progress of animal intelligence through 
an extension of the range in its powers of memory, or in re- 
vived impressions, together with a corresponding increase in 
the vividness of these impressions, has reached a certain point 
(a progress in itself useful, and therefore likely to be secured 
in some part of nature, as one among its numerous grounds of 
selection, or lines of advantage), it becomes possible for such 
an intelligence to fix its attention on a vivid outward sign, 
without losing sight of, or dropping out of distinct attention, 
an image or revived impression ; which latter would only serve, 
in case of its spontaneous revival in imagination, as a sign of the 
same thing, or the same event. Whether the vivid outward 
sign be a real object or event, of which the revived image is 
the counterpart, or whether it be a sign in a stricter meaning 
of the term, — that is, some action, figure, or utterance, associa- 
ted either naturally or artificially with all similar objects or 
events, and, consequently, with the revived and representative 
image of them, — whatever the character of this outward sign 
may be, provided the representative image, or inward sign, 
still retains, in distinct consciousness, its power as such, then 
the outward sign may be consciously recognized as a substi- 
tute for the inward one, and a consciousness of simultaneous 
internal and external suggestion, or significance, might be re- 
alized; and the contrast of thoughts and things, at least in 
their power of suggesting that of which they may be coinci- 
dent signs, could, for the first time, be. perceptible. This would 
plant the germ of the distinctively human form of self-conscious- 
ness. 

Previously to such a simultaneous consciousness of move- 
ments in imagination and movements in the same direction 
arising from perception, realized through the comparative vivid- 
ness of the former, all separate and distinct consciousness of 
the inward sign would be eclipsed, and attention would pass on 
to the thought suggested by the outward sign. A similar phe- 
nomenon is frequently observed with us in successions of in- 
ward suggestions, or trains of thought. The attention often 
skips intermediate steps in a train, or appears to do so. At least, 
the memory of steps, which appear essential to its rational coher- 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CO NSC 10 USNESS. 2 1 1 

ency, has ceased when we revive the train or repeat it volun- 
tarily. This happens even when only a few moments have 
elapsed between the train and its repetition. Some writers 
assert that the omitted steps are immediately forgotten in 
such cases, on account of their feebleness, — as we forget im- 
mediately the details of a view which we have just seen, and 
remember only its salient points; while others maintain that the 
missing steps are absent from consciousness, even in the origi- 
nal and spontaneous movements of the train; or are present 
only through an unconscious agency, both in the train and its 
revival. This being a question of memory, reference cannot 
be made to memory itself for the decision of it. To decide 
whether a thing is completely forgotten, or has never been ex- 
perienced, we have no other resource than rational analogy, 
which, in the present case, appears to favor the theory of 
oblivion, rather than that of latent mental ties and actions; 
since oblivion is a vera causa sufficient to account for the dif- 
ference between such revived trains and those in which no steps 
are missed, or could be rationally supposed to have been pres- 
ent. The theory of "latent mental agency" appears to con- 
found the original spontaneous movement of the train with 
what appears as its representative in its voluntary revival. 
This revival, in some cases, really involves new conditions, 
and is not, therefore, to be rationally interpreted as a pre- 
cisely true recollection. If repeated often, it will establish 
direct and strong associations of contiguity between salient 
steps in the train which were connected at first by feebler 
though still conscious steps. The complete obliteration of 
these is analogous, as I. have said, to the loss, in primary 
forms of memory, of details which are present to conscious- 
ness in actual first perceptions. 

If, as more frequently happens, the whole train, with all 
its steps of suggestion, is recalled in the voluntary revival of 
it (without any sense of missing steps), the feebler interme- 
diate links, that in other cases are obliterated, would corre- 
spond to the feebler, though (in the more advanced animal 
intelligences) comparatively vivid, mental signs which have in 
them the germ, as I have said, of the human form of self-con- 



212 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

sciousness. The growth of this consciousness, its development 
from this germ, is a more direct process than the production of 
the germ itself, which is only incidental to previous utilities 
in the power of memory. Thought, henceforward, may be an 
object to thought in its distinct contrast, as an inward sign, 
with the outward and more vivid sign of that which they both 
suggest, or revive from memory. This contrast is heightened if 
the outward one is more strictly a sign ; that is, is not the per- 
ception of an object or event, of which the inward and repre- 
sentative image is a counterpart, but is of a different nature, for 
instance some movement or gesture or vocal utterance, or some 
graphic sign, associated by contiguity with the object or event, 
or, more properly, with its representative image. The "con- 
cept " so formed is not a thing complete in itself, but is essen- 
tially a cause, or step, in mental trains. The outward sign, the 
image, or inward sign, and the suggested thought, or image, 
form a train, like a train which might be wholly within the imagi- 
nation. This train is present, in all its three constituents, to the 
first, or immediate, consciousness, in all degrees of intelligence ; 
but in the revival of it, in the inferior degrees of intelligence, 
the middle term is obliterated, as in the trains of thought above 
considered. The animal has in mind only an image of the 
sign, previously present in perception, followed now imme- 
diately by an image of what was suggested through the oblit- 
erated mental image. But the latter, in the higher degrees of 
intelligence, is distinctly recalled as a middle term. In the 
revival of past trains, which were first produced through out- 
ward signs, the dumb animal has no consciousness of there 
having been present more than one of the two successive signs, 
which, together with the suggested image, formed the actual 
train in its first occurrence. The remembered outward sign is 
now a thought, or image, immediately suggesting or recalling 
that which was originally suggested by a feebler intermediate 
step. 

In pure imaginations, not arising by actual connections 
through memory, the two terms are just the same with animals 
as in real memory; except that they are not felt to be the 
representatives of a former real connection. The contrast of 



EVOLUTION OF SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 



213 



the real and true with the imaginary and false is, then, the only- 
general one of which such a mind could be aware in the phe- 
nomena of thought. The contrast of thought itself with per- 
ception, or with the actual outward sign and suggestion of the 
thought, is realized only by the revival in memory of the feeble 
connecting link. This effects a contrast not only between what 
is real and what is merely imaginary, but also between what is 
out of the mind and what is within it. The minute difference 
in the force of memory, on which this link in the chain of atten- 
tion at first depended, was one of immense consequence to man. 
This feeble link is the dividing region, interval, or cleft be- 
tween the two more vivid images; one being more vivid as a 
direct recollection of an actual outward impression, and the 
other being more vivid, or salient, from the interest or the mo- 
tives which gave it the prominence of a thought demanding 
attention ; either as a memory of a past object or event of in- 
terest, or the image of something in the immediate future. 
The disappearance altogether of this feeble link would, as I 
have said, take from the images connected by it all contrast 
with any pair of steps in a train, except a consciousness of re- 
ality in the connection of these images in a previous expe- 
rience.* 

* It appears, at first sight, a rash hypothesis to imagine so extensive an action of illu- 
sion as I have supposed in the revivals of memory, — a self-vouching faculty of which, in 
general, the testimony cannot be questioned, — since each recall asserts for itself an 
identity with what is recalled by it, either in past outward experiences or in previous re- 
vivals of them. But the hypothesis of uniform, or frequent, illusions in individual judg- 
ments of memory is not made in contradiction of experiences in general, includ- 
ing those remembered, when reduced to rational consistency. The familiar fact that no 
memory, even of an immediately past experience, is an adequate reproduction of every- 
thing that must have been present in it in actual consciousness, and must have received 
more or less attention, is familiarly verified by repeating the remembered experiences. 
Memory itself thus testifies to its own fallibility. But this is not all. Illusion in an op- 
posite direction, the more than adequate revival of some experiences, so far as vividness 
and apparently remembered details are concerned, affects our memories of dreams, de- 
monstrably in some, presumably in many. What is commonly called a dream is not 
what is present to the imagination in sleep, but what is believed, often illusively, to have 
been present; and is, doubtless, in general, more vivid in memory and furnished with 
more numerous details, owing to the livelier action of imagination in waking moments. 
The liveliness of an actual dream is rather in its dominant feeling or interest than in its 
images. 

The order of internal events, or the order of suggestion in actual dreams, is often re- 
versed in the waking memories of them. A dream very long and full of details, as it 
appears in memory, and taking many words to relate, is sometimes recalled from the 



214 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



To exemplify this somewhat abstruse analysis, let us examine 
what, according to it, would be the mental movements in a 

suggestions and trains of thought in sleep which are comprised in the impressions of a 
few moments. Such a dream usually ends in some startling or interesting event, which 
was a misinterpretation in sleep of some real outward impression, as a loud or unusual 
noise, or some inward sensation, like one of hunger, thirst, heat, cold, or numbness, 
which really stood in sleep at the beginning of the misremembered train of thought, in- 
stead of constituting its denouement in a remembered series of real incidents. The re- 
membered drearn seems to have been an isolated series of such incidents, succeeding 
each other in the natural order of experience; but this appearance may well arise from 
the absence of any remembered indications of a contrary order; or from the absence, on 
one hand, of a consciousness in sleep of anything more vivid than the actual dream, 
and the real feebleness, on the other hand, of the dream itself in respect to everything 
in it except the salient incident, or the dominant interest, which caused it to be remem- 
bered along with the feeble sketch of suggested incidents. Surprise at incongruities in 
parts of trains often constitutes this interest. 

If the waking imagination really fills out this sketch, and avouches the whole without 
check from anything really remembered, the phenomenon would be perfectly accordant 
with what is known of the dealings of imagination with real experiences, and with what 
is to be presumed of the comparative feebleness of its powers in sleep. A remembered 
dream would thus be, in some cases, a twofold illusion, — an illusion in sleep arising from 
misinterpreted sensations, and an illusion in memory concerning what was actually the 
train of thoughts excited by the mistake, the train being in fact often inverted in such 
an apparent recollection. Savages and the insane believe their dreams to be real expe- 
riences. The civilized and sane man believes them to be true memories of illusions in 
sleep. A step farther in the application of the general tests of true experience would 
reduce some dreams to illusive memories of the illusions of sleep. 

There does not appear on analysis, made in conformity to the reality of experiences in 
general, that there is any intrinsic difference between a memory and an imagination, the 
reality of the former being dependent on extrinsic relations, and the outward checks of 
other memories. Memory, as a whole, vouches for itself, and for all its mutually con- 
sistent details, and banishes mere imaginations from its province, not as foreigners, but 
on account of their lawlessness, or incoherence with the rest of its subjects, and it does so 
through the exercise of what is called the judgments of experience, which are in fact 
mnemonic summaries of experiences (including instinctive tendencies). The imagina- 
tions of the insane are in insurrection against this authority of memory in general ex- 
perience, or against what is familiarly called "reason." When sufficiently vivid, or 
powerful, and numerous, they usurp the powers of state, or the authority of memory 
and free intelligent volition. "Reason" is then said to be "dethroned." 

The unreality of some dreams would thus appear to be more complete than they are 
in general discovered to be by mature, sane, and reflective thought, and by indirect ob- 
servations upon their conditions and phenomena. The supposition of a similar illusion 
in the phenomena of reflection on the immediately past, or passing, impressions of the 
mind affords an explanation of a curious phenomenon, not uncommon in waking mo- 
ments, which is referred to by many writers on psychology, namely, the phenomenon of 
experiencing in minute detail what appears also to be recalled as a past experience. 
Some writers have attempted to explain this as a veritable revival, by a passing experi- 
ence, of a really past and very remote one, either in our progenitors, as some evolution- 
ists suppose; or in a previous life, or in some state of individual existence, otherwise 
unremembered, as the mystic prefers to believe; a revival affected by an actual co- 
incidence, in many minute particulars, of a present real experience with a really past 
one. But if a passing real experience could be supposed to be divided, so to speak, or 
to make a double impression in memory, — one the ordinary impression of what is imme- 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CO NSC 10 USNESS. 



215 



man, — let him be a sportsman, — and a domestic animal, — let 
it be his dog, — on hearing a name, — let it be the name of 
some game, as " fox." The general character of the phenom- 
ena in both would be the same on the actual first hearing of 
this word. The word would suggest a mental image of the 
fox, then its movements of escape from its hunters, and the 
thought would pass on and dwell, through the absorbing in 
terest of it, on the hunter's movements of pursuit, or pass on 
even to the capture and destruction of the game. This would, 
doubtless, recall to the minds of the hunter and his hound one 
or more real and distinctly remembered incidents of the sort. 
Now if we suppose this train of thought to be revived (as un- 
doubtedly it is capable of being, both in the man and the dog), 
it will be the same in the man's mind as on its first production ; 
except that the name " fox " w T ill be thought of as an auditory, 
or else a vocal image, instead of being heard ; and the visual 
image of the fox will be recalled by it with all the succeeding 
parts of the repeated train. But in the dog, either the audi- 
tory image of the name will not be recalled, since the vocal 
image does not exist in his mind to aid the recall (his volun- 
tary vocal powers not being capable of forming it even in the 
first instance) ; or if such an auditory image arises, the repre- 
sentative visual or olfactory * one will not appear in distinct 
consciousness. His attention will pass at once from either of 
these signs, but from one only to the more intense and inter- 
esting parts of the train, — to the pursuit and capture of the 
game, or to actually remembered incidents of the kind. Ei- 
ther the first or the immediate sign will remain in oblivion. 

Hence the dog's dreams, or trains of thought, when they are 
revivals of previous trains, or when they rise into prominent 
consciousness in consequence of having been passed through 

diately past, and the other a dream-like impression filled out on its immediate revival in 
reflection with the same details, — the supposition would be in accordance with what is 
really known of some dreams, and would, therefore, be more probable than the above 
explanations. It is possible to trust individual memories too far, even in respect to what 
is immediately past, as it is to trust too far a single sense in respect to what is imme- 
diately present. Rational consistency, in all experiences, or in experience on the whole. 
is the ultimate test of reality or truth in our judgments, whether these are "intuitive," 
or consciously derived. 

* Images in dogs are supposed to depend largely on the sense of smell. 



216 PHILOSOPHICAL DLSCUSSLONS. 

before, omit or skip over the steps which at first served only 
as suggesting and connecting signs, following now only the 
associations of contiguity, established in the first occurrence of 
the train between its more prominent parts. The suggested 
thought eclipses by its glare the suggesting one. The interest 
of an image, or its power to attract attention and increased 
force, depends in the dog only on its vividness as a memory, 
or as a future purpose or event, and very little, if at all, on its 
relations and agency as a sign. Images, as well as outward 
signs, serve, as I have said, in the dumb animals as well as in 
man in this capacity ; but this is not recognized by the animal, 
since those parts of a train which serve only as signs are too 
feeble to be revived in the repeated train ; and new associa- 
tions of mere contiguity in the prominent parts of it take their 
places. All that would be recognized in the animal mind by 
reflection on thought as thought, or independently of its reality 
as a memory, an anticipation, or a purpose, would be its un- 
reality, or merely imaginary character. 

If, on the contrary, a greater intensity, arising from a greater 
power of simple memory, should revive the feebler parts in re- 
peated trains of thought, to the degree of attracting attention 
to them, and thus bringing them into a more distinct and vivid 
consciousness, there might arise an interest as to what they are, 
as to what are their relations, and where they belong, which 
would be able to inspire and guide an act of distinct reflection. 
A thought might thus be determined as a representative mental 
image ; and such acts of reflection, inspired also by other mo- 
tives more powerful than mere inquisitiveness, would by ob- 
servation, analysis, and generalization (the counterparts of 
such outward processes in the merely animal mind) bring all 
such representative images, together with real memories and 
anticipations, into a single group, or subjective connection. 
The recognition of them in this connection is the knowledge 
of them as my thoughts, or our thoughts, or as phenomena of 
the mind. 

When a thought, or an outward expression, acts in an ani- 
mal's mind or in a man's, in the capacity of a sign, it carries 
forward the movements of a train, and directs attention aw ay 



EVOLUTION OF SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 



7 



from itself to what it signifies or suggests; and consciousness 
is concentrated on the latter. But being sufficiently vivid in 
itself to engage distinct attention, it determines a new kind of 
action, and a new faculty of observation, of which the cerebral 
hemispheres appear to be the organs. From the action of 
these, in their more essential powers in memory and imagi- 
nation, the objects or materials of reflection are also derived. 
Reflection would thus be, not what most metaphysicians ap- 
pear to regard it, a fundamentally new faculty in man, as 
elementary and primordial as memory itself, or the power of 
abstractive attention, or the function of signs and represen- 
tative images in generalization ; but it would be determined in 
its contrasts with other mental faculties by the nature of its 
object. On its subjective side it would be composed of the 
same mental faculties — namely, memory, attention, abstraction 
— as those which are employed in the primary use of the senses. 
It would be engaged upon what these senses have furnished to 
memory ; but would act as independently of any orders of 
grouping and succession presented by them, as the several 
senses themselves do of one another. To this extent, reflec- 
tion is a distinct faculty, and though, perhaps, not peculiar to 
man, is in him so prominent and marked in its effects on the 
development of the individual mind, that it may be regarded 
as his most essential and elementary mental distinction in 
kind. For differences of degrees in causes may make differ- 
ences of kinds in effects. 

Motives more powerful than mere inquisitiveness about the 
feebler steps or mere thoughts of a revived train, and more 
efficient in concentrating attention upon them, and upon their 
functions as signs, or suggesting images, would spring from 
the social nature of the animal, from the uses of mental com- 
munication between the members of a community, and from 
the desire to communicate, which these uses would create. 
And just as an outward sign associated with a mental im- 
age aids by its intensity in fixing attention upon the latter, 
so the uses of such outward signs and the motives connected 
with their employment would add extensive force, or interest, 
to the energy of attention in the cognition of this inward sign; 



218 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

and hence would aid in the reference of it and its sort tci the 
subject ego, — a being already known, or distinguished from 
other beings, as that which wills, desires, and feels. That 
which wills, desires, and feels is, in the more intelligent do- 
mestic animal, known by the proper name, which the animal 
recognizes and answers to by its actions, and is a consciousr 
ness of its individuality. It is not known or recognized by 
that most generic name "I"; since phenomena common to 
this individual and to others, or capable of being made com- 
mon through the communications of language, are not dis- 
tinctly referred to the individual self by that degree of abstract- 
ive attention and precision which an habitual exercise of the 
faculty of reflection is required to produce. But, in the same 
manner, the word " world," which includes the conscious sub- 
ject in its meaning, would fail to suggest anything more to 
such an intelligence than more concrete terms do, — such 
as what is around, within, near, or distant from conscious- 
ness; or it would fail to suggest the whole of that which phi- 
losophers divide into ego and non-ego, the outward and inward 
worlds. A contrast of this whole to its parts, however divided 
in predication, or the antithesis of subject and attributes, in a 
divisible unity and its component particulars, would not.be 
suggested to an animal mind by the word " world." The 
"categories," or forms and conditions of human understanding, 
though doubtless innate in the naturalist's sense of the term, 
that is inherited, are only the ways and facilities of the higher 
exercise of the faculty of reflection. They are, doubtless, ways 
and facilities that are founded on the ultimate nature of mind; 
yet, on this very account, are universal, though only potential 
in the animal mind generally; just as the forms and conditions 
of locomotion are generally in the bodies of plants ; forms and 
conditions founded on the ultimate natures or laws of motion, 
which would be exemplified in plants, if they also had the 
power of changing their positions, and are indeed exemplified 
in those forms of vegetable life that are transported, such as 
seeds, or can move and plant themselves, like certain spores. 

The world of self-conscious intellectual activity, — the world 
of mind, — has, doubtless, its ultimate unconditional laws, evety- 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CO NSC 10 USNESS. 2 1 9 

where exemplified in the actual phenomena of abstractive and 
reflective thought, and capable of being generalized in the re- 
flective observations of the philosopher, and applied by him to 
the explanation of the phenomena of thought wherever mani- 
fested in outward expressions, whether in his fellow-men, or in 
the more intelligent dumb animals. Memory, in the effects 
of its more powerful and vivid revivals in the more intelli- 
gent animals, and especially in the case of large-brained man, 
presents this new world, in which the same faculties of observa- 
tion, analysis, and generalization as those employed by intelli- 
gent beings in general, ascertain the marks and classes of 
phenomena strictly mental, and divide them, as a whole class, 
or sum mum genus, from those of the outward world. The dis- 
tinction of subject and object becomes thus a classification 
through observation and analysis, instead of the intuitive dis- 
tinction it is supposed to be by most metaphysicians. Intui- 
tive to some extent, in one sense of the word, it doubtless is; 
that is, facilities and predispositions to associations, which are 
as effective as repeated experiences and observations would be, 
and which are inherited in the form of instincts, doubtless have 
much to do in bringing to pass this cognition, as well as many 
others, which appear to be innate, not only in the lower ani- 
mals but also in man. 

The very different aim of the evolutionist from that of his 
opponents — the latter seeking to account for the resemblances 
of mental actions in beings supposed to be radically different 
in their mental constitutions, while the former seeks to account 
for the differences of manifestation in fundamentally similar 
mental constitutions — gives, in the theory of evolution, a philo- 
sophical role to the word "instinct," and to its contrast with in- 
telligence, much inferior to that which this contrast has had in 
the discussions of the mental faculties of animals. For the 
distinction of instinct and intelligence, though not less real and 
important in the classification of actions in psycho-zoology, and 
as important even as that of animal and vegetable is in general 
zoology, or the distinctions of organic and inorganic, living and 
dead, in the general science of life, is yet, like these, in its ap- 
plications a vague and ill-defined distinction, and is most profit- 



220 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

ably studied in the subordinate classes of actions, and in the 
special contrasts which are summarized by it. Under the nat- 
uralist's point of view, the contrasts of dead and living matters, 
inorganic and organic products, vegetable and animal forms 
and functions, automatic and sentient movements, instinctive 
and intelligent motives and actions, are severally rough divi- 
sions of series, which are clearly enough contrasted in their ex- 
tremities, but ill denned at their points of division. Thus, we 
have the long series beginning with the processes of growth, 
nutrition, and waste, and in movements independent of nervous 
connections, and continued in processes in which sensations 
are involved, first vaguely, as in the processes of digestion, cir- 
culation, and the general stimulative action of the nervous sys- 
tem; then distinctly, as in the stimulative sensations of respi- 
ration, winking, swallowing, coughing, and sneezing, more or 
less under general control or the action of the will. This series 
is continued, again, into those sensations, impulses, and conse- 
quent actions which are wholly controllable, though spontane- 
ously arising; and thence into the motives to action which are 
wholly dependent on, or involved in, the immediate controlling 
powers of the will, — a series in which the several marks of dis- 
tinction are clearly enough designated in the abstract, as the 
colors of the spectrum are by their names, but are not clearly 
separated in the concrete applications of them. 

Again, we have the series of voluntary actions, beginning at 
the connections between perceptions, emotions, and consequent 
actions, which are strictly instinctive. These, though inherited, 
are independent of the effects of higher, and more properly 
voluntary, actions in the individual's progenitors, as well as in 
himself. When they are not simple ultimate and universal 
laws of mental natures, or elementary mental connections, 
they are combinations produced through their serviceableness 
to life, or by natural selection and exercise, that is in the same 
general manner in which bodily organs, powers, and functions 
are produced or altered. Such connections between percep- 
tions, emotions, and consequent actions, derived through nat- 
ural selection, or even those that are ultimate laws, and 
determine, in a manner not peculiar to any species, the con- 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- COJSTSCLO US NESS. 2 2 1 

ditions and uses of serviceable actions, — are instinctive con- 
nections, or powers of instinct, in a restricted but perfectly 
definite use of the word. But following immediately in the 
series of voluntary actions are, first, the inherited effects of 
habits, and next, habits properly so called, or effects produced 
by higher voluntary actions in the individual. Habits prop- 
erly so called, and dispositions, which are the inherited effects of 
habits, are not different in their practical character or modes 
of action from true instincts; but differ only in their origin 
and capacity of alteration through the higher forms of voli- 
tion. The latter, or proper, volitions are connections between 
the occasions, or external means and conditions of an action, 
and the production of the action itself through the motive of 
the end, and not through emotions or by any other ties instinct- 
ively uniting them. They are joined by the foreseen ulterior 
effect of the action, or else through a union produced by its 
influence. The desirableness of what is effected by an action 
connects its occasions, or present means and conditions, with 
the action itself, and causes its production through the end felt 
in imagination. The influence of the end, or ulterior motive 
in volition, may not be a consciously recognized part of the 
action, or a distinctly separated step in it, and will actually 
cease to be the real tie when a series of repeated volitions has 
established a habit, or a fixed association between them and 
their occasions, or external conditions. This connection in 
habits is, as we have said, closely similar to strictly instinctive 
connections, and is indistinguishable from them independently 
of questions of origin and means of alterations. 

Independently of these questions, the series of voluntary ac- 
tions starting from the strictly instinctive joins to them natural 
dispositions, or the inherited effects of habit, and passes on to 
habits properly so called, thence into those in which the ulterior 
motives of true volitions are still operative, though not as sepa- 
rate parts of consciousness, and thence on to mere faculties of 
action, or to those actions in which such a motive is still the sole 
effective link, though quite faded out of distinct attention, or 
attended to with a feeble and intermittent consciousness. 
Thence it comes finally to the distinct recognition in reflective 



222 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

thought of an ulterior motive to an action. The ulterior mo- 
tive, the end or good to be effected by an action, anticipated 
in imagination, joins the action to its present means and con- 
ditions in actual volitions, or else joins it in imagination with 
some future occurrence of them in an intention, or a predeter- 
mination of the will. These ulterior motives, ends, or determi- 
nations of an action through foreseen consequences of it, may 
be within the will, in the common and proper meaning of the 
word, when it is spoken of as free, or unconstrained by an out- 
ward force, or necessity; or they may be without it, like in- 
stinctive tendencies to which the will is said to consent or yield, 
as well as in other cases to be opposed. The motives within 
the will, either distinctly or vaguely operative, or completely 
superseded by forces of habit, constitute the individual's char- 
acter. 

To summarize all the steps and contrasts of these series un- 
der the general heads of intelligence and instinct would be, 
from the evolutionist's and naturalist's point of view, only a 
rough classification, like that of living beings into animals 
and plants; and any attempts at investigating the distinctions 
and classes of mental natures by framing elaborate definitions 
of this summary contrast would be like concentrating all the 
energies of scientific pursuit in biography, and staking its success 
on the question whether the sponge be an animal or a plant. 
This is, in fact, the scholastic method, from which modern sci- 
ence is comparatively, and fortunately, set free; being con- 
tented with finding out more and more about beings that are 
unmistakably animals or plants, and willing to study the nature 
of the sponge by itself, and defer the classification of it to the 
end. The more ambitious scholastic method is followed in the 
science of psycho-zoology by those who seek, in an ultimate defi- 
nition of this sort, to establish an impassable barrier between the 
minds of men and those of the lower animals, — being actuated 
apparently by the naive, though generous, motive of rendering 
the former more respectable, or else of defending a worth in 
them supposed to be dependent on such a barrier. This aim 
would be confusing at least, if not a false one, in a strictly sci- 
entific inquiry. 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CO NSC 10 US NESS. 223 

Although the definition of the subject world through the dis- 
tinction in memory of the phenomena of signification from 
those of outward perception, would be a classification spon- 
taneously arising through inherited facilities and predispositions 
to associations, which are as effective as repeated experiences 
would be, it must still be largely aided by the voluntary char- 
acter of outward signs, — vocal, gestural, and graphic, — -by 
which all signs are brought under the control of the will, or of 
that most central, active personality, which is thus connected 
externally and actively, as well as through the memory, with 
the inward signs or the representative mental images. These 
images are brought by this association under stronger and 
steadier attention; their character, as representative images or 
signs, is more distinctly seen in reflection, and they are not any 
longer merely guides in thought, blindly followed. They form, 
by this association, a little representative world arising to 
thought at will. Command of language is an important con- 
dition of the effective cognition of a sign as such. It is highly 
probable that the dog not only cannot utter the sound "fox," 
but cannot revive the sound as heard by him. The word can- 
not, therefore, be of aid to him in fixing his attention in reflec- 
tion on the mental image of the fox as seen or smelt by him. 
But the latter, spontaneously arising, would be sufficient to 
produce a lively train of thoughts, or a vivid dream. It by no 
means follows from his deficiencies of vocal and auditory im- 
agination that the dog has not, in some directions, aid from 
outward signs, and some small degree of reflective power, 
though this, probably, falls far short of the clear division of the 
two worlds realized in the cognition of "cogito." Thus, he has 
at command the outward sign of the chase, incipient movements 
of his limbs, such as he makes in his dreams ; and this may 
make the mental image of the chase, with its common obsta- 
cles and incidents, distinct in his imagination, in spite of the 
greater interest which carries the thoughts of his dream forward 
to the end of the pursuit, the capture of the game. He may 
even make use of this sign, as he in fact does when he indicates 
to his master by his movements his eagerness for a walk or for 
the chase. 



224 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

Command of signs, and, indeed, all the volitional or active 
powers of an animal, including attention in perception, place it 
in relation to outward things in marked contrast with its pas- 
sive relations of sensation and inattentive or passive perception. 
The distinctness, or prominence, in consciousness given by an 
animal's attention to its perceptions, and the greater energy 
given by its intentions or purposes to its outward movements, 
cannot fail to afford a ground of discrimination between these 
as causes, both of inward and outward events, and those out- 
ward causes which are not directly under such control, but 
form an independent system, or several distinct systems, of 
causes. This would give rise to a form of self-consciousness 
more immediate and simple than the intellectual one, and is 
apparently realized in dumb animals. They, probably, do 
not have, or have only in an indistinct and ineffective form, 
the intellectual cognitions of cogito and sum; but having 
reached the cognition of a contrast in subject and object as 
causes both in inward and outward events, they have already 
acquired a form of subjective consciousness, or a knowledge of 
the ego. That they do not, and cannot, name it, at least by a 
general name, or understand it by the general name of "I" or 
ego, comes from the absence of the attributes of ego which con- 
stitute the intellectual self-consciousness. A dog can, never- 
theless, understand the application of his own proper name to 
himself, both in the direct and the indirect reference of our 
language to his conduct or his wants; and can also understand 
the application to himself of the general name, — " dog." He 
cannot say, "I am a dog," and probably has but the faintest, if 
any, understanding of what the proposition would mean if he 
could utter it; though he probably has as much understanding, 
at least, as the parrot has in saying, " I am Poll." For there 
are, in these propositions, two words expressing the abstractest 
ideas that the human mind can reach. One of them, "I," is 
the name of one of the two summa genera, ego and non-ego, into 
which human consciousness is divisible. "I am a dog," and 
"Camp is a dog," would mean much the same to Camp; just 
as "I am a child," and "John is a child" are not clearly dis- 
tinguished by John even after he has acquired considerable 



EVOLUTION OF SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 



225 



command of language. The other word, "am," is a form of 
the substantive verb expressing existence in general, but further 
determined to express the prese?it existence of the speaker or 
subject. These further determinations, in tense, number, and 
persons, are, however, the most important parts of meaning in 
the various forms of the substantive verb to the common and 
barbarous minds, from which we and the philosophical gram- 
marian have received them. The substantive verb is, accord- 
ingly, irregular in most languages under the form of a gram- 
matical paradigm. In this form the philosophical grammarian 
subordinates to the infinitive meaning of a word those deter- 
minations which, in the invention of words, were apparently- 
regarded as leading ideas in many other cases as well as in the 
substantive verb, and were expressed by words with distinct 
etymologies. 

Not only the dog and other intelligent dumb animals, but 
some of the least advanced among human beings, alsp, are 
unable to arrive at a distinct abstraction of what is expressed 
by "to be," or "to exist." Being is concreted, or determined, 
to such minds down, at least, to the conception of living or 
acting; to a conception scarcely above what is implied in the 
actions of the more intelligent animals, namely, their appre- 
hension of themselves as agents or patients with wills and feel- 
ings distinct from those of other animals, and from the forces 
and interests of outward nature generally. "Your dog is here, 
or is coming, and at your service," is a familiar expression in 
the actions of dogs not remarkable for intelligence. A higher 
degree of abstraction and generalization than the simple steps, 
which are sufficient, as we have seen, for inference in enthy- 
mematic reasonings to particular conclusions, would be required 
in reflection; and a more extensive and persistent exercise of 
the faculty of reflection, aided by voluntary signs or by lan- 
guage, than any dumb animal attains to, would be needed to 
arrive at the cognition of cogito and sum. This is a late acqui- 
sition with children; and it would, indeed, be surprising if the 
mind of a dumb animal should attain to it. But there is little 
ground in this for believing, with most metaphysicians, that the 
cognition is absolutely sui generis, or an ultimate and underived 



226 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

form of knowledge ; or that it is not approached gradually, as 
well as* realized with different degrees of clearness and pre- 
cision, as the faculty of reflection becomes more and more ex- 
ercised. 

That a dumb animal should not know itself to be a thinking 
being, is hardly more surprising than that it should not be 
aware of the circulation of its blood and other physiological 
functions; or that it should not know the anatomy of its frame 
or that of its nervous system, or the seat of its mental facul- 
ties, or the fact that the brain is much smaller in it, in propor- 
tion to the size of its body, than in man. Its reflective obser- 
vation may be as limited in respect to the phenomena of 
thought as the outward observation of most men is in respect 
to these results of scientific research. And, on the other hand, 
the boasted intellectual self-consciousness of man is a knowl- 
edge of a subject, not through all its attributes and phenome- 
na, but only through enough of them in general to determine 
and distinguish it from outward objects, and make it serve as 
the subject of further attributions or predications, as reflective 
observation makes them known. The abstract forms of this 
knowledge, the laws of logic and grammar, and the categories 
of the understanding, which are forms of all scientific knowl- 
edge, are all referable to the action of a purpose to know, and 
to fix knowledge by precise generalization; just as the me- 
chanical conditions of flight are referable to the purpose to fly 
and to secure the requisite means. Generalization already ex- 
ists, however, with particular acts of inquisitiveness in the 
animal mind; and there is required only the proper degree of 
attention to signs in order to make it act in accordance with 
laws which, if they are universal and necessary laivs of the 
mind, are equally laws of the animal intelligence, though not 
actually exemplified in it; just as the laws of locomotion are 
not actually exemplified in the bodies of plants, but are still 
potential in them. 

The inferior and savage races of men, whose languages do 
not include any abstract terms like truth, goodness, and sweet- 
ness, but only concrete ones, like true, good, and sweet, would 
hardly be able to form a conception, even a vague and ob- 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CONSCLO (JSNESS. 2 2J 

scure one, of the mystic's research of omniscience in the pro- 
fundities of self-consciousness. They ought on tlws account, 
perhaps, to be regarded as races distinct from that of these 
philosophers, at least mentally, and to be classed, in spite of 
their powers of speech and limited vocabularies, with the 
dumb, but still intelligent, animals. If, however, the theory 
above propounded be true, this greatest of human qualities, 
intelligent self-consciousness, understood in its actual and 
proper limits, would follow as a consequence of a greater brain, 
a greater, or more powerful and vivid, memory and imagina- 
tion, bringing to light, as it were, and into distinct conscious- 
ness, phenomena of thought which reflective observation refers 
to the subject, already known in the dumb animal, or distin- 
guished as an active cause from the forces of outward nature, 
and from the wills of other animals. The degrees of abstrac- 
tion and the successively higher and higher steps of generali- 
zation, the process which, in scientific knowledge, brings not 
only the particulars of experience under general designations, 
but, with a conscious purpose, brings the less general under the 
more general, or gives common names not only to each and 
all resembling objects and relations, but also more general com- 
mon names to what is denoted by these names, thus grouping 
them under higher categories, — this process brings together 
the several forms of self-consciousness. Willing, desiring, 
feeling, and lastly thinking, also, are seen in thought to belong 
together, or to the same subject; and by thinking they are 
brought under a common view and receive a common name, 
or several common names, to wit, "my mind," "me," "I," 
"my mental states." 

By still further observation, comparison, and analysis on the 
part of philosophers, this step is seen to be the highest degree 
of abstraction, since nothing appears to be common to all my 
mental states, except their belonging together and acting on 
one another, along with their common independence of other 
existences in this mutual action. The word " I " is discovered 
by philosophers to be a word without meaning or determina- 
tion, or to be as meaningless as the words "thing," "being," 
" existence," which are subjects stripped of all attributes. " I " 



22 8 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

is the bare subject of mental phenomena. The word points 
them out, but does not declare anything of their nature by its 
meaning, essence, or implied attribution, which is, in fact, no 
meaning at all. Hence philosophers have placed this term, 
or name, over against that which is not, or in contrast with all 
other existences. Common language has no name for the lat- 
ter, and so philosophers were compelled to call it the non-ego, 
in order to contrast these two highest categories, or summa gen- 
era, into which they divide all of which we are, or may be, 
conscious. Grammatical science, however, furnished con- 
venient substitutes for these words. Ego and non-ego were 
named "subject" and "object." Yet these terms so applied 
do not retain any meanings. " Subject " is applicable to denote 
the ego, rather than the non-ego, only because it is the positive 
or more prominent term of the antithesis in its grammatical ap- 
plication, like "active and passive." Sir William Hamilton 
undertakes, however, to assign them meanings in psychology by 
representing the object as that which is thought about, and the 
subject as that which thinks, or acts, or that in which the thought 
or action inheres. But this definition is given from the active 
subject's point of view, and not from the whole scope of the 
subject-attributes. We act, indeed, in volition and attentive 
perception on the outer world or non-ego ; but in sensation and 
passive perception we are the objects influenced, governed, or 
acted on by this outer world. Moreover, from the point of 
view of the effects of thinking, both the object and subject are 
the subjects of attribution. We attribute qualities to external 
objects, and, at the same time, to their mental images, which, 
in their capacity as representative images, or internal signs of 
objects and relations, are called up and separately attended to 
in the human consciousness, and are, in turn, referred or at- 
tributed to the conscious subject, or to its memory and under- 
standing. 

These images, in their individual capacity, are not to be dis- 
tinguished, even in human consciousness, from the object of per- 
ception. It is in their specific, or notative, function as signs, 
and as referring back to memories of like experiences, which 
they summarize, that they are separately and subjectively cog- 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CONSCLO USNESS. 



129 



nized. Individually they are divisible only into real and unreal, 
or into remembered and imagined combinations of particular 
impressions. As inward and mine they are "concepts." or 
thoughts directing the processes of thought, and are specially 
related to my will and its motives. The classification of events 
as inward and outward dees not necessarily imply that the sci- 
entific process depends on each man's experiences of their con- 
nections alone; for the forms of language, and what is indirectly 
taught in learning a language, guide observation in this matter 
largely; and so, also, very probably, do inherited aptitudes, 
ties, or tendencies to combination, which have the same effect 
in associating the particulars of the individual's experiences as 
the frequent repetitions of them in himself would have, and are,, 
indeed, by the theory of evolution, the consequences of such re- 
peated experiences in the individual's progenitors. Such a 
reference of the distinction of subject and object to instinctive 
tendencies in our minds is not equivalent to the metaphysical 
doctrine that this distinction is intuitive. For this implies 
more than is meant by the word "instinctive" from the natural- 
ist's point of view. It implies that the cognition is absolute: 
independent not only of the individual's experiences, but of all 
possible previous experience, and has a certainty, reality, and 
cogency that no amount of experience could give to an em- 
pirical classification. 

The metaphysical dogmas, for which this formula is given, 
deserve but a passing scientific consideration. Truths inde- 
pendent of all experience are not known to exist, unless we 
exclude from what we mean by "experience" that experience 
which we have in learning the meanings of words and in agree- 
ing to definitions and the conventions of language, on the 
ground that they depend solely, or may be considered as de- 
pending solely, on a lexical authority, from which a kind of 
necessity proceeds, independent of reality in the relations and 
connections of the facts denoted by the words. It is possible 
that laws exist absolutely universal, binding fate and infinite 
power as well as speech and the intelligible use of words; but 
it is not possible that the analytical processes of any finite 
intellect should discover what particular laws these are. Sucli 



230 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

an intellect may legislate with absolute freedom in the realm 
of definition and word-making, provided it limits itself to its 
autonomy, and does not demand of other intellects that they 
shall be governed by such laws as if they were of universal 
application in the world of common experience. It is also 
possible that beliefs, or convictions, exist, supposed by the 
mystic to be independent of all ordinary forms of particular 
experience, "which no amount of experience could produce"; 
but it is not true that there are any universal or scientific beliefs 
of this kind. The effects of inherited aptitudes, and of early, 
long-continued, and constantly repeated experiences in the in- 
dividual, together with the implications of language itself, in 
fixing and in giving force and certainty to an idea or a belief, 
have, probably, not been sufficiently considered by those meta- 
physicians who claim a preternatural and absolute origin for 
certain of our cognitions; and also, perhaps, the more dogmatic 
among these thinkers over-estimate the force and certainty of 
the beliefs, or mistake the kind of necessity they have. The 
essential importance, the necessity and universality in language, 
of pronominal words or signs, should not be mistaken for a real 
a priori necessity in the relations expressed by them. Meta- 
physicians should consider that ego and non-ego. as real ex- 
istences, are not individual phenomena, but groups with 
demonstrative names the least possible determined in meaning, 
or are the most abstract subjects of the phenomena of experi- 
ence, though determined, doubtless, in their applications partly 
by spontaneous, instinctive, or natural and inherited tendencies 
to their formation. 

This view of the origin of the cognition of cogito is equally 
opposed to the schemes of " idealism" and "natural realism," 
which divide modern schools of philosophy. According to the 
"idealists," the conscious subject is immediately known, at least 
in its phenomena, and the phenomena are intuitively known to 
belong to it; while the existence of anything external to the 
mind is an inference from the phenomena of self, or a reference 
of some of them to external causes. Objects are only known 
mediately "by their effects on us." Against this view the 
"natural realist" appeals effectively to the common-sense, or 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CO NSC 10 USNESS. 2 3 1 

natural judgment of unsophisticated minds, and is warranted 
by this judgment in declaring that the object of consciousness 
is just as immediately known as the subject is. But natural 
realism goes beyond this judgment and holds that both the 
subject and object are absolutely, immediately, and equally 
known through their essential attributes in perception. This 
is more than an unlearned jury are competent to say. For if 
by immediacy we mean the relation which a particular unat- 
tributed phenomenon has to consciousness in general, we are 
warranted in saying that immediately, or without the step of 
attribution, subject and object are undistinguished in conscious- 
ness. Thus, the sensations of sound and color and taste and 
pleasure and pain, and the emotions of hope and fear and love 
and hate, if not yet referred to their causes, or even classified as 
sensations a?id e?notio?is, belong to neither world exclusively. 
But so far as any man can remember, no such unattributed or 
unclassified states of consciousness are experienced. He can- 
not say, however, that they cannot exist, or (what is worse for 
the theory) that a state of consciousness cannot be wrongly 
attributed or classified. All states of consciousness are, it is 
true, referred to one or the other, or partly to each of the two 
worlds; and this attribution is, in part at least, instinctive, yet 
not independent of all experience, since it comes either from 
the direct observation of our progenitors, or, possibly, through 
the natural selection of them; that is, possibly through the 
survival of those who rightly divided the worlds, and did not 
often mistake a real danger for a dream or for an imagined 
peril, nor often mistake a dream of security for real safety. If, 
however, we mean by immediacy such an instinctive attribu- 
tion, independent of repeated connections of attributes in their 
subject through the individual's own experiences, then "natural 
realism " is most in accordance with our view, with such ex- 
ceptions as the mistakes and corrections of dreams and hallu- 
cinations imply, and excepting the ontological or metaphysical 
positions that are assumed in it. 

If the natural realist is not also an evolutionist (and usually 
he is not), then his meaning of intuitions must be that they 
are absolute and underived universal facts of connection in 



23 2 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

phenomena. He must suppose that distinct phenomena have 
stamped upon them indelible marks of their ultimate high- 
est class, equivalents for "I" and "not-I," as the individuals 
of a herd of cattle are branded with the mark of their owner. 
Such an immutable mark would, however, render the mistakes 
of insanity, hallucinations, and dreams impossible, or else 
would refer them (as has actually been supposed*) to the 
mystery of the existence of evil, — a convenient disposition of 
philosophical puzzles. In the doctrine of evolution the mean- 
ing of the word " intuition " does not imply immutability in the 
connections of instinctively combined phenomena, except where 
such connection is an ultimate law of nature, or is the simplest 
causal connection, like the laws of motion, or the laws of logic, 
regarding logic as a science and not merely as an art. The 
intuition of space in the blind might be, from this point of view, 
a different combination of sensibilities from that in other men ; 
and the interpretation of sensations of hearing or sight in hallu- 
cinations as being caused by outward objects, when, in reality, 
they arise from disturbances or abnormal conditions of the 
nervous system, would not be an interpretation involving vio- 
lations of ultimate laws, or suspensions in rebellious Nature of 
relations between cause and effect. Variations in intuitions 
and instinctive judgments would be as natural and explicable 
as errors of judgment are in the experiences of the individual 
man. But the doctrine of natural realism, independently of 
that of evolution and the implied mutability of instincts, has 
insurmountable difficulties. 

Idealism, on the other hand, appears to contradict not the 
abnormal, so much as the common, phenomena of conscious- 
ness. It seems to be related to the modern sciences of phys- 
ics and physiology very nearly as natural realism is to scho- 
lastic logic and ontology. Dating from the time of Descartes, 
it appears, in all its forms, to depend on a more exact knowl- 
edge of the bodily apparatus and outward physical causes of 
perception than the ancients possessed. This knowledge made 
it evident that perception, and even sensation, are fully deter- 
mined or realized in the brain only through other parts of the 

* Dr. McCosh, On the Intuitions of the Mind, etc. 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CONSCIO US NESS. 233 

bodily apparatus, and through outward forces and movements 
like those of pressure and vibration. That the perception, or 
sensation, is experienced, or is seated, in the brain, was a nat- 
ural and proper conclusion. That the apparent object of 
perception is not only distant from what thus appeared to 
be the seat of the perception, but that a long series of usually 
unknown, or unnoticed, movements intervenes between it 
and this apparent seat, — these facts gave great plausibility 
to a confused interpretation of the phenomena, namely, that 
the perception is first realized as a state of the conscious ego, 
and, afterwards, is referred to the outward w r orld through 
the associations of general experience, as an effect produced 
upon us by an otherwise unknown outward cause. On simi- 
lar grounds a similar misinterpretation was made of the phe- 
nomena of volition, namely, that a movement in ourselves, 
originally and intuitively known to be ours, produces an effect 
in the outward world at a distance from us, through the inter- 
vention of a series of usually unknown (or only indirectly 
known) agencies. Remote effects of the outer world on us, 
and our actions in producing remote effects on it, appeared to 
be the first or intuitive elements in our knowledge of these 
phenomena, all the rest being derived or inferential. This 
was to confound the seat of sensation or perception in the 
brain with its proper subjectivity, or the reference of it to the 
subject. 

The position in the brain where the last physical condition 
for the production of a sensation is situated is, no doubt, prop- 
erly called the place or seat of the sensation, especially as it is 
through the movements of the brain with other special nervous 
tracts, and independently of any movements out of the nervous 
system, that like sensations are, or can be, revived, though these 
revived ones are generally feebler than those that are set in 
movement by outward forces. Nevertheless, this physiological 
seat of a sensation is no part of our direct knowledge of it. 
A priori we cannot assign it any place, nor decide that it has, 
or has not, a place. The place which we do assign it, in case 
it is outward, is the place determined by a great variety of sen- 
sations and active forms of consciousness experienced in the 



234 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

localization of the object to which it is referred. It is only by 
the association (either spontaneous and instinctive, or acquired) 
of this sensation with those sensations and actions that are 
involved in the localization of the object, that we arrive at 
any notion of its locality. If we do not form any such asso- 
ciations of it with otherwise determined localities, and if it 
and its kind remain after much experience unlocalized, or only 
vaguely localized in our bodies, it is then, but not till then, re- 
ferred to the conscious self as a subjective phenomenon. There 
remains the alternative, of course, in the theory of evolution, 
that the negative experiences, which would thus determine the 
subjective character of a phenomenon, may be the experiences 
of our progenitors, and that our judgment of this character 
may be, in many cases, an instinctive one, arising from the in- 
herited effects of these former experiences. Otherwise this 
judgment in the individual mind, and from its own experiences, 
would appear to be posterior, in point of time, to its acquaint- 
ance with the object world, since this judgment would be de- 
termined by the absence of any uniform connection in the phe- 
nomenon with the phenomena of locality. Instead of being, 
as the theories of idealism hold, first known as a phenomenon 
of the subject ego, or as an effect upon us of an hypothetical 
outward world, its first unattributed condition would be, by 
our view, one of neutrality between the two worlds. 

In dissenting, therefore, from both extremes, — the theory 
of idealism and that of natural realism, or assenting to the lat- 
ter only as qualified by the theory of evolution, — I have sup- 
posed both theories to be dealing with the two w r orlds only as 
worlds of phenomena, without considering the metaphysical 
bearings and varieties of them with respect to the question of 
the cognition of non-phenomenal existences, on the grounds of 
belief in an inconceivable and metaphysical matter or spirit ; 
for, according to the view proposed as a substitute for these 
extremes, subject and object are only names of the highest 
classes, and are not the names of inconceivable substrata of 
phenomena. Ontology or metaphysics would not be likely to 
throw much original light on the scientific evolution of self- 
consciousness; but it becomes itself an interesting object of 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CONSCLO USNESS. 235 

study as a phase of this evolution seen in the light of science. 
When one comes to examine in detail the supposed cognitions 
of super-sensible existences, and the faculty of necessary truth 
which is called " the reason," or else is described in its sup- 
posed results as the source of necessary beliefs or convictions, 
or of natural and valid hypotheses of inconceivable realities, 
great difficulty is experienced, on account of the abstract char- 
acter of the beliefs, in distinguishing what is likely to be strictly 
inherited from what is early and uniformly acquired in the de- 
velopment of the faculty of reflection, and especially from 
.what is imbibed through language, the principal philosophical 
instrument of this faculty. The languages employed by phi- 
losophers are themselves lessons in ontology, and have, in their 
grammatical structures, implied conceptions and beliefs com- 
mon to the philosopher and to the barbarian inventors of lan- 
guage, as well as other implications which the former takes 
pains to avoid. How much besides he ought to avoid, in the 
correction of conceptions erroneously derived from the forms 
of language, is a question always important to be considered 
in metaphysical inquiries. 

The conception of substance, as a nature not fully involved in 
the contrast of essential and accidental attributes, and the con- 
nection, or co-existence, of them in our experiences ; or the con- 
ception of substance as also implying the real, though latent, co- 
existence of all attributes in an existence unknown to us, or 
known only in a non-phenomenal and inconceivable way, — this 
conception needs to be tested by an examination of the possi- 
ble causes of it as an effect of the forms of language and other 
familiar associations, which, however natural, may still be mis- 
leading. To the minds of the barbarian inventors of language, 
words had not precise meanings, for definition is not a bar- 
barian accomplishment. Hence, to such minds, definite and 
precise attributions, as of sweetness to honey and sugar, or 
light to the day, to the heavenly bodies, or to fire, are strongly 
in contrast with the vagueness which appears to them inherent 
in substantive names, — inherent not as vagueness, however, 
but as something else. Such names did not clearly distinguish 
persons and things, for the day and the heavenly bodies were 



236 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

personal, and fire apparently was an animal or a spirit. Re- 
moving as much as possible of mere crudeness from such concep- 
tions, predication would yet appear to be a reference of some- 
thing distinctly known to something essentially unknown, or 
known only by one or a few attributes needed to distinguish it 
by a name, as proper names distinguish persons. The meaning 
of this name, and the conception of it as meaning much more, 
and as actually referring to unapparent powers of bringing to 
light attributes previously unknown, — powers manifested in an 
actual effect when a new attribute is added in predication, — 
this vague, ill-defined, and essentially hidden meaning is assimi- 
lated in grammar, and thence in philosophy, to an agent put- 
ting forth a new manifestation of itself in a real self-assertion. 
The contrast of "active and passive" in the forms of 
verbs illustrates how the barbaric mind mounted into the 
higher regions of abstraction in language through concrete 
imaginations. The subject of a proposition, instead of being 
thought of as that vaguely determined group of phenomena 
with which the predicate is found to be connected, was thought 
either to perform an action on an object as expressed through 
the transitive verb, or to be acted on by the object as ex- 
pressed through the passive form, or to put forth an action 
absolute, expressed by the neuter verb, or to assert its past, 
present, or future existence absolutely, and its possession of 
certain properties as expressed by the substantive verb, and 
by the copula and predicate. This personification of the 
subject of a proposition, which is still manifested in the forms 
and terminology of grammar, is an assimilation of things to 
an active, or at least demonstrative, self-consciousness or 
personality. It had hardly reached the degree of abstrac- 
tion needed for the clear intellectual self-consciousness of 
cogito. It rather implied that things also think. The inven- 
tion of substantive names for attributes, that is, abstract names, 
like goodness or truth, — an invention fraught with most im- 
portant consequences to human knowledge, — brought at first 
more prominently forward the realistic tendencies which phi- 
losophers have inherited from the barbarian inventors of lan- 
guage. Abstract names do not seem to have been meant at 



EVOLUTION OF SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 



2 37 



first to be the direct names of attributes, or collections of attri- 
butes, as " goodness " and " humanity," but to be the names of 
powers (such as make things good, or make men what they are), 
names which appear to be results of the earliest conscious or sci- 
entific analysis in the progress of the human mind, but which 
are strongly tainted still by the barbaric conception of words as 
the names of active beings. Abstract words were not, however, 
as active or demonstrative as their savage progenitors, the 
concrete general substantives. They appear rather as artifi- 
cers, or the agents which build up things, or make them what 
they are. But, by means of them, concrete general names 
were deprived of their powers and reduced to subjection. To 
have direct general names, and to have general powers, seem 
to be synonymous to savage and semi-barbarous mind. 

I have spoken as if all this were a matter of past history, 
instead of being an actually present state of philosophical 
thought, and a present condition of some words in the minds 
of many modern thinkers. The misleading metaphors are, it 
is true, now recognized as metaphors; but their misleading 
character is not clearly seen to its full extent. The subjects 
of propositions are still made to do the work, to bear the im- 
positions, to make known the properties and accidents ex- 
pressed by their predicates, or to assert their own existence 
and autonomy, just so far as they are supposed to be the names 
of anything but the assemblages of known essential qualities or 
phenomena actually co-existent in our experiences, that is of 
the qualities which their definitions involve, and to which other 
attributes are added (but from which they are not evolved) in 
real predication; or just so far as they are supposed to be the 
names of unknown and imperceptible entities. Names are 
directly the designations of things, not of hidden powers, or 
wills, in things. But it is not necessary to regard them as pre- 
cisely definable, or as connoting definite groups of qualities or 
the essential attributes of things, in order that they may fulfill 
the true functions of words; for they are still only the names 
of things, not of wills in things, on the one hand, nor of "con- 
cepts" or thoughts in us, on the other hand. They are syno- 
nyms of "concepts," if we please to extend synonymy so as 



238 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

to include the whole range of the signs of things ; but both the 
"concept" and its verbal synonym may be, and generally are, 
vague. For just as in the major premises of syllogisms the sub- 
ject is, in general, a co-designation of two undivided parts of a 
class of objects, one known directly to have, or lack, the attri- 
butes affirmed or denied in this premise, and the other part, 
judged by induction to be also possessed, or not possessed of 
them, — a co-designation in which the conclusion of the syllogism 
is virtually contained, so as to make the syllogism appear to be a 
petitio principii (as it would be but for this implied induction*),— 
so in the simple naming of objects the names may be properly re- 
garded as the names of groups of qualities, in which groups 
the qualities are partly known and partly unknown, predication 
in real (not verbal) propositions being the conversion of the 
latter into the former. But in this view of the functions of 
words, it is necessary, at least, to suppose enough of the known 
attributes of objects to be involved in the meanings of their 
names to make the applications of the names distinct and defi- 
nite. Names, with the capacity they would thus acquire, or have 
actually had, in spite of metaphysics, of having their meanings 
modified or changed, are best adapted to the functions of words 
in promoting the progress of knowledge. From this use of 
words their essences, both the apparent and the inscrutable, 
have disappeared altogether, except so far as the actual exist- 
ence and co-existence of the known attributes of objects are im- 
plied by names, or so far as the co-existence of these with pre- 
viously unknown ones is also implied by the use of names as 
the subjects of propositions. No inscrutable powers in words 
or things, nor any immutable connections among the attributes 
called essential, are thus imposed upon the use of words in 
science. 

Metaphysicians, on the other hand, in nearly all that is left to 
the peculiar domain of their inquiries, possess their problems 
and solutions in certain words, such as "substance," "cause," 
"matter," "mind," which still retain, at least in metaphysical 
usage, the barbaric characters we have examined. Matter 
and mind, for example, still remain, not only with meta- 

* See Mill's Logic, Book II., chapter iii. 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CONSCLO US NESS. 239 

physicians, but also with the vulgar, designations of unknown 
inscrutable powers in the outward and inward worlds, or 
powers which, according to some, are known only to a higher 
form of intuition through the faculty of "Reason"; or, being 
really inscrutable and inconceivable by any human faculty, 
as others hold, are, nevertheless, regarded as certainly ex- 
istent, and attested by irresistible natural beliefs. That beliefs 
in beings, unknown and unknowable, are real beliefs, and 
are natural (though more so to some minds than to others), 
seems a priori probable on the theory of evolution, without 
resorting to the effects of early training and the influence of 
associations in language itself, by which the existence of 
such beliefs is accounted for by some scientific philosophers. 
But the authority which the theory of evolution would assign 
to these beliefs is that of the conceptions which barbarous 
and vulgar minds have formed of the functions of words, 
and of the natures which they designate. Inheritance of 
these conceptions, that is, of aptitudes or tendencies to their 
formation, and the continued action of the causes so admirably 
analyzed by Mr. Mill,* through which he proposes to account 
for these beliefs directly, and which have retained, especially 
in the metaphysical conception of "matter," the barbarian's 
feelings and notions about real existence as a power to produce 
phenomena, are sufficient to account for the existence of these 
beliefs and their cogency, without assigning them any force as 
authorities. 

That some minds have inherited these beliefs, or the tendency 
to form them, more completely than others, accords with a dis- 
tinction in the mental characters of philosophers which Pro- 
fessor Masson makes in his work on Recent British Philosophy, 
and illustrates by the philosophies of Mr. Carlyle, Sir W. Ham- 
ilton, and Mr. Mill, namely, the differences arising from the 
degrees in which the several thinkers were actuated by an 
"ontological faith," or an " ontological feeling or passion," 
which, according to Professor Masson, has in the history of the 
world amounted to " a rage of ontology," and has been the 
motive of wars and martyrdoms. This passion would appear, 

* See Mill's Examination of Hamilton, chapter xi. 



2 4 o PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

according to the theory of evolution, to be a survival of the bar- 
barian's feelings and notions of phenomena as the outward show 
of hidden powers in things, analogous to his own expressions 
in language and gesture of his will or interior activity. As 
he assigned his own name, or else the name "I," to this act- 
ive inward personality, and not to the group of external charac- 
ters by which he was known to his fellow-barbarians ; and as he 
also named and addressed them as indwelling spirits, so he 
seemed to apply his general designations of things. The traces 
of this way of regarding names and things, surviving in the 
grammatical inventions and forms of speech, which the barba- 
rian has transmitted to us, include even the sexes of things. 
The metaphysical meanings of the terms "substance," "mat- 
ter," "mind," "spirit," and "cause" are other traces. The 
metaphysical realism of abstract terms appears, in like manner, 
to be a trace of an original analysis of motives in the powers 
of things to produce their phenomena, analogous to the bar- 
barian's analysis of motives in his own will or those of his fel- 
lows. 

According to Professor Masson, Sir W. Hamilton was 
strongly actuated by "the ont.ological passion." This would 
mean, according to our interpretation of it, that he had inher- 
ited, or had partly, perhaps, imbibed from his philosophical 
studies, the barbarian's mode of thought. And it appeared in 
the metaphysical extension which he gave to the doctrine of 
natural realism, which, with him, was not merely the doctrine 
of the equal immediacy and the instinctive attribution of sub- 
jective and objective phenomena, but included also natural 
beliefs in the equal and independent, though hidden, existences 
of the metaphysical substrata of matter and mind. He was, 
nevertheless, so far influenced by modern scientific modes of 
thought that he did not claim for these natural beliefs at all the 
character of cognitions, nor did he claim determinate concep- 
tion of these existences except as to their mutual independence. 
He rejected the metaphysician's invention of a faculty of 
"reason," cognizant of supersensible realities; and really con- 
tradicted himself in claiming, with most modern thinkers, 
that knowledge of phenomena is the only possible knowledge, 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CONS CIO USNESS. 24 1 

while he held that belief in what could not thus be known had 
the certainty of knowledge, and was in effect knowledge, 
though he did not call it knowledge.* 

Another point in Sir W. Hamilton's philosophy illustrates 
our theory on a different side. While contending for the equal 
immediacy of our knowledge of subject and object, he, never- 
theless, held that the phenomena of the subject had a superior 
certainty to those of the object, on the ground that the latter 
could be doubted (as they were by certain idealists) without 
logical contradiction, while the former could not be, since to 
doubt the existence of the subject would be to doubt the doubt, 
and thus neutralize it. To say nothing of other objections to 
this as a criterion of subjective certainty, it is obvious that it 
has no cogency as applied to the metaphysical, or non-phe- 
nomenal, existence of the subject. To doubt that a doubt in- 
heres in a non-phenomenal subject, is not to doubt the existence 
of the doubt itself as a phenomenon, or even as a phenomenon 
referable to the subject group of phenomena. In regard to the 
impossibility of doubting the existence of this subject group, 
which, as including the doubt itself, would thus neutralize it, 
we ought to distinguish between a doubt of a doubt as a mere 
phenomenon of consciousness generally, that is as unattributed 
either to subject or object, and the doubt of the validity of the 
attribution of it to the subject. There can be logical con- 
tradiction only in respect to attribution, either explicit or im- 
plicit, and so far as the doubt is merely a phenomenon of which 
nothing is judged or known but its actual existence in conscious- 
ness, a doubt of it, though impossible, is yet not so on grounds 
of logical contradiction. Its actual presence would be the only 
proof of its presence, its actual absence the only proof of its 
absence. But this is equally true of all phenomena in con- 
sciousness, generally. If in reflection we examine whether a 
color of any sort is present, we have inquired, not merely about 
the bare existence of a phenomenon of which the phenomenon 
itself could alone assure us, but about its classes, whether it is 
a color or not, and what sort of a color; and we should attrib- 
ute it, if present, to the object world, or the object group of 

* See Mill's Examination of Hamilton, chapter v. 
II 



242 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



phenomena, by the very same sort, if not with the same degree, 
of necessity which determines the attribution of a doubt to the 
subject-consciousness. If now, having attributed the color or 
the doubt to its proper world, we should call in question the 
existence of this world, we should contradict ourselves; and 
this would be the case equally whether the attribution was 
made to the outward world, as of the color, or to the inward 
world, as of the doubt. 

There may be different kinds of reflective doubt about either 
phenomenon. We should not ordinarily be able to question 
seriously whether the doubt belonged to the class. " doubts," 
its resemblance to others of the class being a relation of phe- 
nomena universal and too clear to be dismissed from attention ; 
and the color would call up its class with equal cogency, as 
well as the class of surfaces or spaces in which it appears al- 
ways inherent. But we might doubt, nevertheless, seriously 
and rationally, whether a doubt had arisen from rational con- 
siderations in our minds, or from a disease of the nervous sys- 
tem, from hypochondriasis, or low spirits. So also in regard to 
the color and the forms in which it appears embodieJ, we may 
reasonably question whether the appearence has arisen from 
causes really external, or from disease, as in hallucinations. 

There remains one other source of misunderstanding about 
the comparative certainty of " I think," and of that which I 
think about. The attributions contained in the latter may be 
particular, empirical, and unfamiliar, or based on a very limited 
experience and on this account maybe uncertain; while the 
very general and highest attribution of the thought to myself 
will be most certain. The superior certainty of the clause "I 
think" over that which I think about disappears, however, as 
soon as the latter is made an attribution of equal simplicity, 
generality, and breadth in my experience ; as when I say, " I 
think that there is an outer world," or, " I think that beings 
beside me exist." "To think that I think," is not more prop- 
erly the formula of consciousness in general than "To think 
that a being not-I is thought about." It is not even the com- 
plete formula of ^"-consciousness, which, as we have seen, has 
several forms not necessarily coeval. To think that I will, 



EVOLUTION OF SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 



243 



that I desire, that I feel, is, as we have seen, to refer these 
several forms of consciousness to the thinking subject; or, 
more properly, to refer willing, desiring, feeling, and thinking 
all to the same subject "I" ; which is related to the latter 
attribute more especially, merely because the name "I" is 
given only in and through the recognition of this attribute in 
the cognition of cogito. To infer the existence of the subject 
from the single attribute of thinking would be to unfold only 
in part its existence and nature; though it would note that at- 
tribute of the subject through the recognition of which in re- 
flection its name was determined and connected with its other 
attributes. 

The latter, namely, our volitions, desires, and feelings, are in 
general so obscure in respect to the particular causes which 
precede them and are anterior to their immediate determination 
or production, that introspective observation in reflection can 
penetrate only a little way, and is commonly quite unable to 
trace them back to remote causes in our characters, organiza- 
tions, and circumstances. Hence, the conception of the causes 
of our own inward volitions, or our desires and intentions, as 
being of an inscrutable, non-phenomenal nature, would nat- 
urally arise. But this conception would probably be made 
much more prominent in the unreflective barbarian's mind, by 
his association of it with the obscurity to him of the inward, or 
personal, causes of outward actions and expressions in others. 
Darkness is seen where light is looked for and does not appear. 
Causes are missed where research is made without success. 
We are conscious of minds in other men and in other animals 
only through their outward expressions. The inward causes 
are not apparent or directly known to us as phenomena; and 
though the inference of their existence is not in all cases, even 
with men, made through analogy, or from an observation of 
their connections with similar outward actions and expressions 
in ourselves, but is grounded, doubtless, in many cases on an 
instinctive connection between these expressions in others and 
feelings, at least, in ourselves, yet we do not think of them as 
really inscrutable in their natures, but only as imperceptible to 
our outward senses. They have their representatives in the phe- 



244 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



nomena of our imaginations. These would be but vaguely 
conceived, however, in many ca~es. Even reverence in the 
barbarian's mind might prevent him, as an obedient subject, 
from attempting to fathom or reproduce in his own imagina- 
tion the thoughts and intentions of his majesty the king. Rev- 
erence is not, however, in any case, an unreflective or thought- 
less feeling. It would not be like the feelings of the sheep, 
which, not being able to comprehend through its own experi- 
ence the savage feelings of the wolf, would only interpret his 
threatening movements as something fearful, or would con- 
nect in an instinctive judgment these outward movements only 
with anticipated painful consequences. Reverence in the loyal 
barbarian subject would not go so far as to make his king ap- 
pear a mere automaton, as the wolf might seem to the sheep. 
The commands of his king, or of his deity, would be to him 
rather the voice of a wisdom and authority inscrutable, the 
outward manifestation of mysterious power, the type of meta- 
physical causation. Accordingly, we find that a capacity for 
strong, unappropriated feelings of loyalty and reverence, de- 
manding an object for their satisfaction, have also descended 
to those thinkers who have inherited " the ontological passion." 
It would, therefore, appear most probable, that the meta- 
physician's invincible belief in the conception of the will as a 
mysterious power behind the inward phenomena of volition, 
and as incapable of analysis into the determinations of char- 
acter, organization, and circumstances, arises also from in- 
herited feelings about the wills of other men rather than from 
attentive observation of the phenomena of his own. 

Science and scientific studies have led a portion of the hu- 
man race a long way aside from the guidance of these inherited 
intellectual instincts, and have also appeared able to conquer 
them in many minds to which in youth they seemed invinci- 
ble. Positivists, unlike poets, become — are not born — such 
thinkers. The conception of the causes of phenomena, with 
which these studies render them familiar, had small beginnings 
in the least noble occupations and necessities of life, and in 
the need of knowing the future and judging of it from present 
signs. From this grew up gradually a knowledge of natural 



EVOLUTION OF SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 



2 45 



phenomena, and phenomena of mind also, both in their out- 
ward and combined orders or laws and in their intimate and 
elementary successions, or the "laws of nature." The latter 
are involved in the relation of effects to their "physical" 
causes, so called because metaphysicians have discovered that 
they are not the same sort of powers as those which the in- 
vincible instincts look for as ultimate and absolute in nature. 
But this is not a new or modern meaning of the word "cause." 
It was always its practical, common -sense, every-day mean- 
ing; — in the relations of means to ends; in rational explana- 
tions and anticipations of natural events; in the familiar proc- 
esses and observations of common human life ; in short, in the 
relations of phenomena to phenomena, as apparent causes and 
effects. This meaning was not well defined, it is true ; nor is 
it now easily made clear, save by examples; yet it is by ex- 
amples, rather than by a distinct abstraction of what is com- 
mon to them, that the use of many other words, capable of 
clear definition, is determined in common language. The re- 
lations of invariable succession in phenomena do not, except 
in ultimate laws where the phenomena are simple or element- 
ary, define the relation of phenomenal cause and effect ; for, 
as it has been observed, night follows day, and day follows 
night invariably, yet neither is the cause of the other. These 
relations belong to the genus of natural successions. The re- 
. lation of cause and effect is a species of this genus. It means 
an unconditiofial, invariable succession; independence of other 
orders of succession, or of all orders not involved in it. 

The day illuminates objects; the night obscures them; the 
sun and fires warm them ; the clouds shed rain upon them ; 
the savage animal attacks and hurts others : these facts in- 
volve natural orders, in which relations of cause and effect are 
apparent, and are indicated in the antitheses of their terms as 
the subjects and objects of transitive propositions. But these 
relations are only indicated; they are not explicitly set forth. 
Metaphysics undertakes their explication by referring the il- 
lumination, obscurity, warmth, rain and hurt to powers in the 
day, the sun and fires, the clouds, and the animal. Modern 
metaphysics would not go so far as to maintain, in the light 



246 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

of science, that the powers in these examples are inscrutable, 
or incapable of further analysis. Nevertheless, when the' 
analysis is made, and the vision of objects, for example, is 
understood to arise from the incidence of the light of the sun 
on the air and on objects, and thence from reflections on all 
surfaces of objects, and thence again from diffused reflections 
falling partly on our eyes, and so on to the full realization of 
vision in the brain, all according to determinate laws of suc- 
cession, — an analysis which sets forth those elementary invari- 
able orders, or ultimate and independent laws of succession 
in phenomena, to which, in their independent combinations, 
science refers the relations of cause and effect ;— when this 
analysis has been made, then metaphysics interposes, and, 
from its ancient habits of thought, ascribes to the elementary 
antecedent a power to produce the elementary consequent. Or 
when the effect, as in vision, follows from the ultimate proper- 
ties and elementary laws of great numbers of beings and 
arrangements, — the sun, the medium of light, the air, the 
illuminated objects, the eye, its nerves and the brain, — and 
follows through a long series of steps, however rapid, from the 
earliest to the latest essential antecedent, metaphysics still 
regards the whole process, with the elementary powers in- 
volved, as explicated only in its outward features. There is 
still the mystery inherent in the being of each elementary 
antecedent, of its power to produce its elementary consequent ; 
and these mysterious powers, combined and referred to the 
most conspicuous essential conditions of the effect (like the 
existence of the sun and the eye), make in the whole a mys- 
tery as great as if science had never inquired into the process. 
Metaphysics demands, in the interest of mystery, why an 
elementary antecedent is followed by its elementary conse- 
quent. But this question does not arise from that inquisi- 
tiveness which inspires scientific research. It is asked to 
show that it cannot be answered, and hence that all science 
rests on mystery. It is asked from the feelings that in the 
barbarian or the child forbid or check inquiry. But, being 
a question, it is open to answer; or it makes legitimate, at 
least, the counter-question, When can a question be properly 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CONS CIO USNESS. 



247 



asked ? or, What is the purpose of asking a question ? Is it 
not to discover the causes, classes, laws, or rules that determine 
the existence, properties, or production of a thing or event? 
And when these are discovered, is there any further occasion 
for inquiry, except in the interest of feelings which would have 
checked inquiry at the outset? The feelings of loyalty and 
reverence, instinctive in our natures, and of the utmost value 
in the history of our race, as the mediums of co-operation, dis- 
cipline, and instruction, are instincts more powerful in some 
minds than in others, and, like all instincts, demand their 
proper satisfaction. From the will, or our active powers, they 
demand devotion; from the intellect, submission to authority 
and mystery. But, like all instincts, they may demand too 
much; too much for their proper satisfaction, and even for 
their most energetic and useful service to the race, or "to the 
individual man. Whether it is possible for any one to have 
too much loyalty, reverence, love, or devotion, is, therefore, 
a question which the metaphysical spirit and mode of thought 
suggest. For in the mystic's mind these feelings have set 
themselves up as absolute excellencies, as money sets itself up 
in the mind of the miser. And it is clear that, under these 
absolute forms, it is difficult to deny the demand. It is only 
in respect to what is reverenced, loved, or worshiped, or 
what claims our allegiance, that questions of how much of 
them is due can be rationally asked. 

To demand the submission of the intellect to the mystery 
of the simplest and most elementary relations of cause and ef- 
fect in phenomena, or the restraint of its inquisitiveness on 
reaching an ultimate law of nature, is asking too much, in that 
it is a superfluous demand. The intellect in itself has no dis- 
position to go any further, and, on the other hand, no impulse 
to kneel before its completed triumph. The highest generality, 
or universality, in the elements or connections of elements in 
phenomena, is the utmost reach both in the power and the de- 
sire of the scientific intellect. Explanation cannot go, and 
does not rationally seek to go, beyond such facts. The inven- 
tion of noumena to account for ultimate and universal proper- 
ties and relations in phenomena arises from no other necessity 



248 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

than the action of a desire urged beyond the normal prompt- 
ings of its power. To demand of the scientific intellect that 
it shall pause in the interest of mystery at the movements of a 
falling body or at the laws of these movements, is a misappro- 
priation of the quality of mystery. For mystery still has its 
uses; and, in its useful action, is an ally of inquisitiveness, in- 
citing and guiding it, giving it steadiness and seriousness, op- 
posing only its waywardness and idleness. It fixes attention, 
even inquisitive attention, on its objects, and in its active form 
of wonder "is a highly philosophical affection. " So also de- 
votion, independently of its intrinsic worth in the mystic's re- 
gard, has -its uses; and these determine its rational measure, 
or how much of it is due to any object. In its active forms 
of usefulness and duty, it is an ally of freedom in action, op- 
posing this freedom only in respect to what would limit it still 
more, or injuriously and on the whole. 

The metaphysical modes of thought and feeling foster, on 
the other hand, the sentiments of mystery and devotion in their 
passive forms, and as attitudes of the intellect and will, rather 
than as their inciting and guiding motives. These attitudes, 
which are symbolized in the forms of religious worship, were 
no doubt needed to fix the -attention of the barbarian, as they 
are still required to fix the attention of the child upon serious 
contemplations and purposes. Obedience and absolute sub- 
mission are, at one stage of intellectual and moral development, 
both in a race and in the individual, required as the conditions 
of discipline for effecting the more directly serviceable and 
freer action of the mind and character under the guidance of 
rational loyalty and reverence. The metaphysical modes of 
thought and feeling retain these early habits in relations in 
which they have ceased to be serviceable to the race, or to the 
useful development of the individual, especially when in the 
mystic's regard obedience has acquired an intrinsic worth, and 
submission has become a beatitude. The scientific habit of 
thought, though emancipated from any such outward supports 
and constraints, is yet not wanting in earnestness of purpose 
and serious interests, and is not without the motives of devotion 
and mystery, or their active guidance in the directions of use- 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CO NSC 10 US NESS. 



249 



fulness and duty, and in the investigations of truth. It does 
not stand in awe before the unknown, as if life itself depended 
on a mysterious and capricious will in that unknown ; for awe 
is habitual only with the barbarian, and is a useful motive only 
in that severe instruction which is exacted by the wants, in- 
securities, and necessities of his life, while among the partially 
civilized it often constrains the thoughtless by a present fear to 
avoid or resist evils really greater than what is feared, though 
less obvious to the imagination. 

Nevertheless, the whole nature of the modern civilized man 
includes both these opposing tendencies in speculation, the 
metaphysical and scientific ; the disposition to regard the phe- 
nomena of nature as they appeared naturally and serviceably 
in the -primitive use of language and reflection, and the dispo- 
sition of the Positivist to a wholly different interpretation of 
them. A conflict between them arises, however, only where 
either disposition invades the proper province of the other; 
where both strive for supremacy in the search for a clearer 
knowledge of these phenomena, or where both aim to satisfy the 
more primitive and instinctive tendencies of the mind. In the 
forms of ontological and phenomenological, or metaphysical and 
positive philosophies, this conflict is unavoidable and endless. 
Deathless warriors, irreconcilable and alternately victorious, 
according to the nature of the ground, or to advantages of posi- 
tion, continually renew their struggles along the line of develop- 
ment in each individual mind and character. A contrast of tend- 
encies analogous to this, which involves, however, no necessary 
conflict, is shown in the opposition of science and poetry; the 
one contemplating in understanding and in fixed positive beliefs 
the phenomena which the other contemplates through firmly 
established and instinctive tendencies, and through interests, 
which for want of a better name to note their motive power, or 
influence in the will, are also sometimes called beliefs. Dis- 
putes about the nature of what is called "belief," as to what 
it is, as well as to what are the true grounds or causes of it, 
would, if the meanings of the word were better discriminated 
in common usage, be settled by the lexicographer; for it is 
really an ambiguous term. Convictions of half-truths, or inti- 



250 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

mations of truth, coupled with deep feeling, and impressed by 
the rhythms and alliterations of words, are obviously different 
from those connections which logic and evidence are calcu- 
lated to establish in the mind. 

The poet inherits in his mental and moral nature, or organic 
memory, and in his dispositions of feeling and imagination, the 
instinctive thoughts and feelings which we have supposed habit- 
ual and useful in the outward life of the barbarian. In the mel- 
ody of his verses he revives the habits which were acquired, 
it is believed, in the development of his race, long before 
any words were spoken, or were needed to express its imag- 
inations, and when its emotions found utterance in the music 
of inarticulate tones. The poet's productions are thus, in part, 
reproductions, refined or combined in the attractive forms of 
art, of what was felt and thought before language and science 
existed ; or they are restorations of language to a primeval use, 
and to periods in the history of his race in which his progeni- 
tors uttered their feelings, as of gallantry, defiance, joy, grief, 
exultation, sorrow, fear, anger, or love, and gave expression to 
their light, serious, or violent moods, in modulated tones, harsh 
or musical ; or later, in unconscious figures of speech, expressed 
without reflection or intention of communicating truth. For, as 
it has been said, it is essential to eloquence to be heard, but 
poetry is expression to be only overheard. In supposing this 
noble savage ancestry for the poet, and for those who overhear 
in him, with a strange delight and interest, a charm of natural- 
ness and of novelty combined by the magic of his art, it is not 
necessary to conclude that all savage natures are noble, or have 
in them the germs of the poet's inspiration. It is more probable 
that most of the races which have remained in a savage state 
have retained a more primitive condition, in many respects, 
than that of civilized men, because they lacked some qualities 
possessed by the noble savage which have advanced him to the 
civilized state, and because they have been isolated from the 
effects of such qualities either to improve or exterminate them. 
The noble savage is not, at any rate, now to be found. Weed- 
ing out the more stupid and brutal varieties has, doubtless, been 
the effective method of nature in the culture of the nobler quali- 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CONSCIO US NESS. 251 

ties of men, at least in that state of nature which was one of 
warfare. 

It is a common misconception of the theory of evolution to 
suppose that any one of contemporary races, or species de- 
rived from a common origin, fully represents the characters 
of its progenitors, or that they are not all more or less diver- 
gent forms of an original race ; the ape, for example, as well 
as the man, from a more remote stock, or the present savage 
man, as well as the civilized one, from a more recent common 
origin. Original differences within a race are, indeed, the con- 
ditions of such divergences, or separations of a race into several ; 
and original superiorities, though slight at first and accidental, 
were thus the conditions of the survival of those w T ho possessed 
them, and of the extinction of others from their struggles in 
warfare, in gallantry, and for subsistence. The secondary 
distinctions of sex, or contrasts in the personal attractions, 
in the forms, movements, aspects, voices, and even in some 
mental dispositions of men and women, are, on the whole, 
greatest in the races which have accomplished most, not 
merely in science and the useful arts, but more especially in 
the arts of sculpture, painting, music, and poetry. And this in 
the theory of evolution is not an accidental conjunction, but a 
connection through a common origin. Love is still the theme 
of poets, and his words are measured by laws of rhythm, which 
in a primeval race served in vocal music, with other charms, to 
allure in the contests of gallantry. There would, /doubtless, 
have arisen from these rivalries a sort of self-attention,* or an 
outward self-consciousness, which, together with the conscious- 
ness of themselves as causes distinct from the wills or agencies 
of other beings, and as having feelings, or passive powers, and 
desires, or latent volitions, not shared by others, served in the 
case of the primitive men as bases of reference in their first at- 
tention to the phenomena of thought in their minds, when these 
became sufficiently vivid to engage attention in the revival of 
trains of images through acts of reflection. The consummate 
self-consciousness, expressed by " I think," needed for its gen- 

* See Darwin's Expression of the Emotions in Men and Animals. Theory of Blushing, 
chapter xiii. 



2 5 2 . PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

esis only the power of attending to the phenomena of thought 
as signs of other thoughts, or of images revived from memory, 
with a reference of them to a subject ; that is, to a something 
possessing other attributes, or to a group of co-existent phe- 
nomena. The most distinct attention to this being, or subject, 
of volitions, desires, feelings, outward expressions, and thoughts 
required a name for the subject, as other names were required 
for the most distinct attention to the several phenomena them- 
selves. 

This view of the origin of self-consciousness is by no means 
necessarily involved in the much more certain and clearly ap- 
parent agency of natural selection in the process of develop- 
ment. For natural selection is not essentially concerned in the 
first production of any form, structure, power, or habit, but 
only in perpetuating and improving those which have arisen 
from any cause whatever. Its agency is the same in preserving 
and increasing a serviceable and heritable feature in any form 
of life, whether this service be incidental to some other already 
existing and useful power which is turned to account in some 
new direction, or be the unique and isolated service of some 
newly and arbitrarily implanted nature. Whether the powers 
of memory and abstractive attention, already existing and useful 
in outward perceptions common to men and others of the more 
intelligent animals, were capable in their higher degrees and 
under favorable circumstances (such as the gestural and vocal 
powers of primeval man afforded them) of being turned to a 
new service in the power of reflection, aided by language, or 
were supplemented by a really new, unique, and inexplicable 
power, in either case, the agency of natural selection would 
have been the same in preserving, and also in improving, the 
new faculty, provided this faculty was capable of improvement 
by degrees, and was not perfect from the first. The origin of 
that which through service to life has been preserved, is to this 
process arbitrary, indifferent, accidental (in the logical sense 
of this word), or non-essential. This origin has no part in the 
process, and is of importance with reference to it only in de- 
termining how much it has to do to complete the work of cre- 
ation. For if a faculty has small beginnings, and rises to great 



E VOL UTION OF SELF-CONSCIO US NESS. 2 53 

importance in the development of a race through natural selec- 
tion, then the process becomes an essential one. But if men 
were put in possession of the faculties which so pre-eminently 
distinguish them by a sudden, discontinuous, arbitrary cause 
or action, or without reference to what they were before, ex- 
cept so far as their former faculties were adapted to the service 
of the new ones, then selection might only act to preserve or 
maintain at their highest level faculties so implanted. Even 
the effects of constant, direct use, habit, or long-continued ex- 
ercise might be sufficient to account for all improvements in a 
faculty. The latter means of improvement must, indeed, on 
either hypothesis, have been very influential in increasing the 
range of the old powers of memory, attention, and vocal utter- 
ance through their new use. 

The outward physical aids of reflective thought, in the artic- 
ulating powers of the voice, do not appear to have been firmly 
implanted, with the new faculty of self-consciousness, among 
the instincts of human nature; and this, at first sight, might 
seem to afford an argument against the acquisition by a natu- 
ral process of any form of instinct, since vocal language has 
probably existed as long as any useful or effective exercise 
of reflection in men. That the faculty which uses the voice in 
language should be inherited, while its chief instrument is 
still the result of external training in an art, or that language 
should be " half instinct and half art," would, indeed, on sec- 
ond thought, be a paradox on any other hypothesis but that 
of natural selection. But this is an economical process, and 
effects no more than what is needed. If the instinctive part in 
language is sufficient to prompt the invention and the exercise 
of the art,* then the inheritance of instinctive powers of articu- 
lation would be superfluous, and would not be effected by se- 
lection; but would only come in the form of inherited effects 
of habit, — the form in which the different degrees of aptitude 
for the education of the voice appear to exist in different races 
of men. Natural selection would not effect anything, indeed, 

* In the origin of the languages of civilized peoples, the distinction between powers of 
tradition, or external inheritance, and proper invention in art becomes a very important 
one, as will be shown farther on. 



254 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



for men which art and intelligence could, and really do, effect, 
— such as clothing their backs in cold climates with hair or fur, 
— since this would be quite superfluous under the furs of other 
animals with which art has already clothed them. The more 
instinctive language of gestures appears also to have only in- 
direct relations to real serviceableness, or to the grounds of 
natural selection, and to depend on the inherited effects of 
habit, and on universal principles of mental and physiological 
action.* 

The language of gestures may, however, have been sufficient 
for the realization of the faculty of self-consciousness in all that 
the metaphysician regards as essential to it. The primitive 
man might, by pointing to himself in a meditative attitude, 
have expressed in effect to himself and others the " I think," 
which was to be, in the regard of many of his remote descendants, 
the distinguishing mark, the outward emblem, of his essential 
separation from his nearest kindred and progenitors, of his met- 
aphysical distinction from all other animals. This conscious- 
ness and expression would more naturally have been a source 
of proud satisfaction to the primitive men themselves, just as 
children among us glory most in their first imperfect command 
of their unfolding powers, or even in accomplishments of a 
unique and individual character when first acquired. To the 
civilized man of the present time, there is more to be proud 
of in the immeasurable consequences of this faculty, and in 
what was evolved through the continued subsequent exercise 
of it, especially through its outward artificial instruments in 
language, — consequences not involved in the bare faculty it- 
self. As being the pre-requisite condition of these uses and in- 
ventions, it would, if of an ultimate and underived nature, be 
worthy the distinction, which, in case it is referable to latent 
natures in pre-existing faculties, must be accorded to them in 
their higher degrees. And if these faculties are common to all 
the more intelligent animals, and are, by superior degrees 
only, made capable of higher functions, or effects of a new and 
different kind (as longer fins enable a fish to fly), then the main 
qualitative distinction of the human race is to be sought for in 

* See Darwin's Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals. 






EVOLUTION OF SELF CONSCIOUSNESS. 



255 



these effects, and chiefly in the invention and use of artificial 
language. 

This invention was, doubtless, at first made by men from 
social motives, for the purpose of making known to one another, 
by means of arbitrarily associated and voluntary signs, the 
wishes, thoughts, or intentions clearly determined upon in their 
imaginations. Even now, children invent words, or, rather, at- 
tribute meanings to the sounds they can command, when they 
are unable to enunciate the words of the mother tongue which 
they desire for the purposes of communication. It is, perhaps, 
improper to speak of this stage of language as determined by 
conscious invention through a recognized motive, and for a 
purpose in the subjective sense of this word. It is enough 
for a purpose (in its objective sense) to be served, or for a ser- 
vice to be done, by such arbitrary associations between internal 
and external language, or thought and speech, however these 
ties may, in the first instance, be brought about. The inten- 
tion and the invention become, however, conscious acts in re- 
flection when the secondary motives to the use of language 
begin to exert influence, and perhaps before the latter have begun 
to be reflectively known, or recognized, and while they are still 
acting as they would in a merely animal mind. These mo- 
tives are the needs and desires (or, rather, the use and impor- 
tance), of making our thoughts clearer to ourselves, and not 
merely of communicating them to others. Uncertainty, or per- 
plexity from failures of memory or understanding, render the 
mnemonic uses of vivid external and voluntary signs the agents 
of important services to reflective thought, when these signs are 
already possessed, to some extent, for the purposes of com- 
munication. These two uses of language, — the social, and the 
meditative or mnemonic, — carried to only a slight develop- 
ment, would afford the means of recognizing their own values, 
as well as the character of the inventions of which languages 
would be seen to consist. Invention in its true sense, as a re- 
flective process, would then act with more energy in extending 
the range of language. 

Command of language is a much more efficient command 
of thought in reflective processes than that which is implied in 



256 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



the simplest form of self-consciousness. It involves a command 
of memory to a certain degree. Already a mental power, 
usually accounted a simple one, and certainly not involved in 
" I think," or only in its outward consequences, has been de- 
veloped in the power of the will over thought. Voluntary 
memory, or reminiscence, is especially aided by command of 
language. This is a tentative process, essentially similar to 
that of a search for a lost or missing external object. Trials 
are made in it to revive a missing mental image, or train of 
images, by means of words; and, on the other hand, to revive 
a missing name by means of mental images, or even by other 
words. It is not certain that this power is an exclusively hu- 
man one, as is generally believed, except in respect to the 
high degree of proficiency attained by men in its use. It does 
not appear impossible that an intelligent dog may be aided 
by its attention, purposely directed to spontaneous memories, 
in recalling a missing fact, such as the locality of a buried 
bone. 

In the earlier developments of language, and while it is still 
most subject to the caprices and facilities of individual wills (as 
in the nursery), the character of it as an invention, or system 
of inventions, is, doubtless, more clearly apparent than it after- 
wards becomes, when a third function of language rises into 
prominence. Traditions, by means of language, and customs, 
fixed by its conservative power, tend, in turn, to give fixity to 
the conventions of speech; and the customs and associations 
of language itself begin to prescribe rules for its inventions, 
or to set limits to their arbitrary adoption. Individual wills 
lose their power to decree changes in language; and, indeed, at 
no time are individual wills unlimited agents in this process. 
Consent given on grounds not always consciously determining 
it, but common to the many minds which adopt proposals or 
obey decrees in the inventions of words, is always essential to 
the establishment or alteration of a language. But as soon as 
a language has become too extensive to be the possible invention 
of any single mind, and is mainly a tradition, it must appear to 
the barbarian's imagination to have a will of its own ; or, rather, 
sounds and meanings must appear naturally bound together, 



EVOLUTION OF SELF-CONSCIOUSXESS. 



2 57 



and to be the fixed names and expressions of wills in things. 
And later, when complex grammatical forms and abstract sub- 
stantive names have found their way into languages, they must 
appear like the very laws and properties of nature itself, which 
nothing but magical powers could alter; though magic, with its 
power over the will, might still be equal to the miracle. With- 
out this power not even a sovereign's will could oppose the au- 
thority of language in its own domain. Even magic had failed 
when an emperor could not alter the gender of a noun. Edu- 
cation had become the imperial power, and schoolmasters were 
its prime ministers. 

From this point in the development of language, its separa- 
tions into the varieties of dialects, the divergences of these into 
species, or distinct languages, and the affinities of them as 
grouped by the glossologist into genera of languages, present 
precise parallels to the developments and relations in the or- 
ganic world which the theory of natural selection supposes. 
It has been objected* to the completeness of these parallels 
that the process of development in languages is still under the 
control of men's wills. Though an individual will may have 
but little influence on it, yet the general consent to a proposed 
change is still a voluntary action, or is composed of voluntary 
actions on the part of the many, and hence is essentially dif- 
ferent from the choice in natural selection, when acting within 
its proper province. To this objection it may be replied, that 
a general consent to a change, or even an assent to the reasons 
for it, does not really constitute a voluntary act in respect to 
the whole language itself; since it does not involve in itself 
any intention on the part of the many to change the language. 
Moreover, the conscious intention of effecting a change on the 
part of the individual author, or speaker, is not the agent by 
which the change is effected; or is only an incidental cause, 
no more essential to the process than the causes which produce 
variations are to the process of natural selection in species. 
Let the causes of variation be what they may, — miracles even, — 
yet all the conditions of selection are fulfilled, provided the va- 

* See article on Schleicher and the Physical Theory of Language, in Professor W. 
D. Whitney's Oriental and Linguistic Studies. 



258 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

nations can be developed by selection, or will more readily oc- 
cur in the selected successors of the forms in which they first 
appear in useful degrees. These conditions do not include the 
prime causes of variations, but only the causes which facilitate 
their action through inheritance, and ultimately make it nor- 
mal or regular. 

So, also, the reasons or motives which in general are not 
consciously perceived, recognized, or assented to, but none the 
less determine the consent of the many to changes in language, 
are the real causes of the selection, or the choice of usages in 
words. Let the cause of a proposed change in language be 
what it may — an act of free will, a caprice, or inspiration even 
— provided there is something in the proposition calculated to 
gain the consent of the many, — such as ease of enunciation, 
the authority of an influential speaker or writer, distinctness 
from other words already appropriated to other meanings, the 
influence of vague analogies in relations of sound and sense 
(accidental at first, but tending to establish fixed roots in 
etymology, or even to create instinctive connections of sound 
and sense), — such motives or reasons, common to the many, 
and not their consenting wills, are the causes of choice and 
change in the usages of speech. Moreover, these motives are 
not usually recognized by the many, but act instinctively. 
Hence, there is no intention in the many, either individually 
or collectively, to change even a single usage, — much less a 
whole language. The laws or constitution of the language, as 
it exists, appear, even to the reflecting few, to be unchanged; 
and the proposed change appears to be justified by these laws, 
as corrections or extensions of previous usages. 

The case is parallel to the developments of legal usages, or 
principles of judicial decisions. The judge cannot rightfully 
change the laws that govern his judgments ; and the just judge 
does not consciously do so. Nevertheless, legal usages change 
from age to age. Laws, in their practical effects, are amelio- 
rated by courts as well as by legislatures. No new principles 
are consciously introduced ; but interpretations of old ones, 
and combinations, under more precise and qualified state- 
ments, are made, which disregard old decisions, seemingly by 



EVOLUTION OF SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 



259 



new and better definitions of that which in its nature is unal- 
terable, but really, in their practical effects, by alterations, at 
least in the proximate grounds of decision ; so that nothing is 
really unalterable in law, except the intention to do justice un- 
der universally applicable principles of decision, and the in- 
stinctive judgments of so-called natural law. 

In like manner, there is nothing unalterable in the traditions 
of a language, except the instinctive motives to its acquisition 
and use, and some instinctive connections of sense and sound. 
Intention — so far as it is operative in the many who determine 
44'hat a language is, or what is proper to any language — is 
chiefly concerned in not changing it ; that is, in conforming to 
what is regarded by them as established usage. That usages 
come in under the form of good and established ones, while in 
fact they are new though good inventions, is not due to the 
intention of the speakers who adopt them. The intention of 
those who consciously adopt new forms or meanings in words 
is to conform to what appears legitimate ; or it is to fill out or 
improve usages in accordance with existing analogies, and not 
to alter the essential features in a language. But unconsciously 
they are also governed by tendencies in themselves and others, 
— vague feelings of fitness and other grounds of choice which 
are outside of the actual traditions of speech; and, though a 
choice" may be made in their minds between an old and a really 
new usage, it is commonly meant as a truly conservative choice, 
and from the intention of not altering the language in its 
essence, or not following what is regarded as a deviation from 
correct usage. The actual and continuous changes, completely 
transforming languages, which their history shows, are not, 
then, due to the intentions of those who speak, or have spoken, 
them, and cannot, in any sense, be attributed to the agency 
of their wills, if, as is commonly the case, their intentions are 
just the reverse. For the same wills cannot act from contra- 
dictory intentions, both to conserve and to change a language 
on the whole. 

It becomes an interesting question, therefore, when in general 
anything can be properly said to be effected by the will of man. 
Man is an agent in producing many effects, both in nature and 



260 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

in himself, which appear to have no different general character 
from that of effects produced by other animals, even the low- 
est in the animal series, or by plants, or even by inorganic 
forces. Man, by transporting and depositing materials, in 
making, for example, the shell-mounds of the stone age, or the 
works of modern architecture and engineering, or in commerce 
and agriculture, is a geological agent ; like the polyps which 
build the coral reefs, and lay the foundations of islands, or make 
extensions to mainlands ; or like the vegetation from which the 
coal-beds were deposited; or like winds, rains, rivers, and the 
currents of the ocean ; and his agency is not in any way differ- 
ent in its general character, and with reference to its geological 
effects from that of unconscious beings. In relation to these 
effects his agency is, in fact, unconscious, or at least unintended. 
Moreover, in regard to internal effects, the modification of 
his own mind and character by influences external to himself, 
under which he comes accidentally, and without intention; 
many effects upon his emotions and sentiments from impressive 
incidents, or the general surroundings of the life with which 
he has become associated through his own agency, — these, as 
unintended effects, are the same in general character, as if his 
own agency had not been concerned in them, — as if he had 
been without choice in his pursuits and surroundings. 

Mingled with these unintended effects upon himself, there 
are, of course, others, either actually or virtually intended, and, 
therefore, his own effects. If, for example, in conformity with 
surrounding fashions of dress, he should choose to clothe him- 
self, and should select some one from the existing varieties in 
these fashions, or should even add, consciously, a new feature to 
them from his individual taste in dress, in each case he would 
be acting from intention, and the choice would be his own. 
But so far as he has thus affected the proportions among these 
varieties, or tends further to affect them by his example, the 
action is not his own volition, unless we include within the 
will's agency what is properly said to act either through or upon 
the will ; namely, that which, by an undistinguished influence, 
guides taste and choice in himself and the others who follow 
unconsciously his example. Those influences of example and 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CO NSC 10 US NESS. 2 6 1 

instinctive, or even educated, tastes, which are not raised by 
distinct attention into conscious motives, would not be allowed 
by the metaphysician to be parts in the will's action. It would 
not be within but through its action that these influences would 
produce their unintended effects. According to the less definite 
and precise physical theory of the will's action, these effects 
might be regarded as voluntary; but then the choice would not 
be different in its character from that effected through other 
kinds of physical agency. On neither theory, therefore, can 
unintended effects, or the effects of unrecognized causes acting 
through the will, be regarded as different in their character 
from the general results of selection in nature. On the phys- 
ical theory of the will, man's agency is merged in that of 
nature generally ; but according to the metaphysician's more 
definite understanding oj" voluntary actions, which is also 
<£- that of common usage, intention would appear to be the mark 
by which to determine whether anything is the effect of the 
will of man, except in an accidental or non-essential manner. 
An apparently serious objection to this test arises, however, 
in reference to another mark of voluntary action, and of the 
efficacy of the will. The mark of responsibility (the subject of 
moral or legal discipline, the liability to blame or punish- 
ment) is justly regarded as the mark of free human agency. 
But the limits set by this mark are beyond what is actually 
intended in our actions. We are often held responsible, and 
properly, for more than we intend, or for what we ought to 
have intended. The absence of intention (namely, of the inten- 
tion of doing differently) renders us liable to blame, when it 
is involved in the absence of the more general intention of 
doing right, or of doing what the discipline of responsibility 
has commanded or implied in its commands. Carelessness, or 
want of forethought, cannot be said to involve intention in any 
case, but in many cases it is blameworthy or punishable ; since 
in such cases moral discipline presupposes or presumes inten- 
tion, or else seeks, as in the case of children, by punishment to 
turn attention upon moral principles, and upon what is implied 
in them, whether set forth in instincts, examples, precepts, or 
commandments. But this extension of the sphere of personal 



262 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

agency and accountability to relations in which effects upon 
will and character are sought to be produced by moral and 
legal discipline, its extension beyond what the will itself pro- 
duces in its direct action, has nothing to do with strictly scien- 
tific or theoretical inquiries concerning effects, in which neither 
the foreseeing nor the obedient will can be an agent or factor, 
but of which the intellect is rather the recorder, or mere ac- 
countant. 

If the question concerning the origin of languages were, 
Who are responsible for their existence and progressive changes, 
or ought to be credited for improvements, or blamed for defi- 
ciences in them ? or if the question were, How men might or 
should be made better inventors, or apter followers of the 
best inventions, — there would then be some pertinency in 
insisting on the agency of man in their developments, — an 
agency which, in fact, like his agency in geology, is incidental 
to his real volitions, and is neither involved in what he in- 
tends nor in what he could be made to intend by discipline. 
So far as human intentions have had anything to do with 
changes in the traditions of language, they have, as we have 
said, been exerted in resisting them. Hence the traditions of 
language, with all the knowledge, histories, arts, and sciences 
involved and embodied in them, are developments incidental, 
it is true, to the existence and exercise of self-consciousness, 
and of free or intelligent wills, yet are" developments around 
and outside of them, so to speak, and were added to them 
rather than evolved from them. These developments were 
added through their exercise and serviceableness as powers 
which stand to the more primitive ones of self-conscious 
thought and volition in relations similar to those we have seen 
to exist between the latter and the still more primitive powers 
of mind in memory and attention. 

These relations come, first, from turning an old power to a 
new account; or making a new use of it, when the power, de- 
veloped for other uses, acquires the requisite energy (as when 
the fins of a fish become fitted for flying); or when the re- 
vivals of memory become vivid enough to make connecting 
thoughts in a train distinct and apparent as mere signs to a 



E VOL UTION OF SELF- CONS CIO USNESS. 2 63 

reflective attention. Secondly, the new use increases the old 
power by its exercise and serviceableness (as flying and its 
value to life make the fins of the fish still longer), or as the 
exercise and importance to life of reflective thought make the 
revivals of memory still more vivid, and enlarge its organ, the 
brain. Traditions of language, or established artifices of ex- 
pression, are related to new uses in a power, now in turn be- 
come sufficiently energetic, which at first was only the power of 
associating the sounds of words with thoughts, and thence with 
their objects, and which was incidental to the distinct recog- 
nition of thoughts as signs, or suggestions, of other thoughts. 
Developed by exercise and its serviceableness to life to the 
point, not only of making readily and employing temporarily 
such arbitrary associations, but also of fixing them and trans- 
mitting them as a more or less permanent language, or system 
of signs, this power acquired, or was turned to, a use involving 
immeasurable consequences and values. 

To choose arbitrarily for preservation and transmission one 
out of many arbitrary associations of sounds with a meaning 
could not have been a rational or intelligent act of free will, 
but ought rather to be attributed to chance, lot, or fate; or to 
will, in the narrower sense of the word in which one man is 
said to have more than another, or to be more willful, that is, 
persistent in his caprices. To make by decree any action per- 
manent and regular which in itself is transient or accidental 
requires will, it is true, in one sense, or sticking to a point, 
merely because it has been assumed ; as some children do in 
imposing their inventions upon their associates. This degree 
of arbitrariness appears necessary to the step in the use of 
signs which made them traditions of language, permanent 
enough to be the roots of a continued growth in it, — a growth 
which must, however, have determined more and more the 
selections of new words, and new uses in old ones, through 
motives common to the many speakers of a language; such as 
common fancies, instinctive tendencies, facilities, allegiance ( 
to authority, and associations in general — the vague as well 
as distinct ones — which were common to many speakers. 
These causes would act instinctively, or unconsciously, as well 



264 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

as by design. Tyranny in the growth of language, or the 
agency of arbitrary wills, persisting in their caprices, must 
have disappeared at an early date, or must have become insig- 
nificant in its effects upon the whole of any established lan- 
guage. Intentional choice would henceforward have the design 
generally of conserving or restoring a supposed good usage; 
though along with unintended preferences, instinctively fol- 
lowed, it would, doubtless, have the effect of slowly changing 
the usages of language on the whole. A happy suggestion of 
change would be adopted, if adopted consciously, with refer- 
ence to its supposed conformity to the genius of the language, 
or to its will, rather than to the will of an individual dictator ; 
and the influence of a speaker would depend on the supposi- 
tion that he knew best how to use the language correctly, or 
was intimate with its genius. But suggestions of change 
would be more likely to be adopted unconsciously. 

History can trace languages back only, of course, to the 
earliest times of their representations in phonetic writings or 
inscriptions; as palaeontology can trace organic species back 
only to the earliest preservation of them as fossils in the rocks. 
In neither case do we probably go back to periods in which 
forms were subject to sudden or capricious variations. Natural 
selection would, therefore, define the most prominent action of 
the causes of change in both of them. But just as govern- 
ments in all their forms depend on the fixedness and force of 
traditions, and as traditions gained this force through the wills 
of those in the past who established them by arbitrary decrees, 
and induced in others those habits of respect *and obedience 
which now preserve them, so in language there was, doubtless, 
a time when will was the chief agent in its formation and pres- 
ervation. But it was Will in its narrower sense, which does 
not include all that is commonly meant by volitional action. 
The latter involves, it is true, persistence in some elements, — 
a persistence in memory and thought of consciously recognized 
motives, principles, purposes, or intentions. Volition is an 
action through memory, and not merely from a present stimu- 
lus, and is accompanied, when free or rational, by the recogni- 
tion in thought of the motive, the proximate cause of the action, 



£ VOL UTION OF SELF- CONSCLO US NESS. 265 

the reasons for it, or the immediate and present tendency to it, 
which is referred back in turn, but is not analyzed, nor usually 
capable of being analyzed introspectively into still more remote 
antecedents in our histories, inherited disposition, characters, 
and present circumstances. Those causes which are even too 
feeble, to be introspectively recognized are not, of course, the 
source whence the force or energy of will is derived; but inde- 
pendently of their directive agency, this force is indistinguisha- 
ble from that of pure spontaneity or vital energy. In like 
manner, the force of water in a system of river-courses is not 
"f' determined by its beds and banks, but is none the less guided 
by them. This water-force in the first instance, and from time 
to time, alters its courses, but normally flows within predeter- 
mined courses; as the energy of will flows normally within the 
directive, but alterable, courses of character and circumstances. 
The really recognized motives in ordinary volition generally 
, include more than the impulse or satisfaction of adhering to 
an assumed position, or to a purpose, for the will's sake, as in 
mere will, or willfulness which is an overflow, so to speak, 
of energy, directed only by its own inertia, though often useful 
in altering character, or the courses of volition, both in the will 
itself and the wills of others. The habit of conscious per-, 
sistence, involved in will, but most conspicuous in self-will, 
was, together with its correlatives, respect and obedience, 
doubtless serviceable to the rulers of primeval men, the 
authors of human government; and was, doubtless, developed 
through this serviceableness before it was turned to new uses 
in the institution of arbitrary customs and traditions. It thus 
illustrates anew the general principle shown in the several 
previous steps of this progress, namely, the turning of an old 
power to a new account, or making a new use of it, when 
the power has acquired the requisite energy; and the subse- 
quent further increase of the power through serviceableness 
and exercise in its new function. 

This power in the wills of the political, military, and relig- 
ious leaders of men must soon, after producing the apotheosis 
of the more influential among them, have been converted into 
the sacred force of tradition; that is, into the fas or commands 
12 



2 66 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

of languages themselves, and of other arbitrary customs. Hence- 
forth and throughout all the periods included in the researches 
of comparative philology in which written remains of lan- 
guages are to be found, it is probable that no man has con- 
sciously committed, or had the power to commit, the sin of 
intentionally altering their traditions, except for reasons com- 
mon to many speakers and afforded by the traditions them- 
selves. 



THE CONFLICT OF STUDIES* 

Among the most advanced nations, in this age of sceptical 
inquiry, — an age sceptical in the old and good sense of the 
word (noting that close examination of a subject which 
orthodox philosophers and divines have for so many centuries 
stamped with a black mark), — in this age nothing seems 
likely to escape a radical re-examination by discussion and 
experiment. Those matters for which a genuine loyalty 
might still be counted on to conserve past usages, the means, 
influences, and appliances to which scholars and men of cult- 
ure acknowledge their deepest indebtedness, have not proved 
exceptions. 

That there should, if possible, be a science of education, 
founded on something more than the traditions of the art or 
the success of past usages, appears to be the present demand 
of reformers. The wide-spread and growing conviction, that 
universities have not advanced their knowledge of their duties 
to mankind or to their several nations at the same pace as 
other useful institutions, and that legislative interference ought 
to undertake what the incumbents of University places have 
neglected, has given so great alarm to the latter, that they 
have turned a most energetic and earnest attention to the sub- 
ject. The discussion, so far, has developed little more than 
the many-sidedness and extreme difficulties in practice of the 
problems of education. This, together with the zeal exhibited 
by the best university men, to bring all the light they possess 
or can command to bear on the discussion, will doubtless 
serve the purpose about which they seem most solicitous, — the 

* From the North American Review, July, 1873. 



2.68 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

purpose of avoiding, if possible, revolutionary measures, and 
the "danger that any reform should be adopted because some 
reform is required." * 

The problems of the higher general education of the univer- 
sities, — what it should be, whether a simple curriculum or a 
variety of courses; what constitutes nowadays, a liberal edu- 
cation; what are its ends; what are their relative degrees 
of importance in a general education, or in one preparatory in 
a general way, as the lower school training is, to more specific 
studies or pursuits, — these problems have rather been exhibited 
in their difficulties than advanced towards a solution by recent 
discussions. It is well observed by Mr. Pattison, Rector of 
Lincoln College, Oxford, that the difficulties in w r hich element- 
ary education is implicated, great as they are, are difficulties 
of action: — " How to carry through what we know ought to be 
done." "The university question is quite otherwise." "There 
would be little difficulty in getting anything done, if we could 
see our way clearly to what we do want." To make the re- 
formers outside of the universities feel this, and feel that the 
problem can only be solved by men practically acquainted with 
the business of education, seems to be one of the aims of uni- 
versity writers. Yet, we imagine that those who demand 
reform, in the name of the nation, look upon these writers as 
they would upon men pursuing other kinds of business, who, 
in the practice of means honored by long usage, and especially 
in devising the secondary and subsidiary means, are apt to 
have but dim perceptions of the ends to which the machinery 
or appliances of the art are as a whole, or should be, adapted. 
The means of the higher education, like all other means in 
practices of which the ends are manifold, conflicting, and only 
vaguely conceived, are naturally enough sought for by these 
writers in that kind of experience which is embodied in customs 
and institutions, rather than in philosophy or in a scientific 
analysis of the experience. 

Next to the claim which their acquaintance with the details 
of practice gives to university writers on education, they rely 

* Suggestions on Academical Organization, with especial Reference to Oxford. By 
Mark Pattison, B. D. 1868. 



THE CONFLICT OF STUDIES. 



269 



on this slowly developed experiment (as they would like to 
have it regarded) which the past usages of universities offer 
to observation; although without definite purposes or guiding 
questions, not implicated in an experience, its evidence, can 
hardly with propriety be regarded as experimental. It is quite 
true, and a just complaint of conservative thinkers, that the 
projects of reformers, the proposed changes in subjects, text- 
books, and methods of the higher education, have no better 
title to be regarded as experiments philosophically devised. 
Most criticisms on what universities have done heretofore 
are expressions of little more than dissatisfaction with the choice 
of text-books, or even of subjects, or with methods of teaching 
and examination in subjects, in which the critics either have 
failed, or have reached only a slight proficiency; and advice is 
most freely proffered by those who are least acquainted with 
the matters in which they demand reform. 

Upon a recent discussion in a scientific periodical con- 
cerning what modern elementary treatise is best adapted to 
take the place of Euclid (now considered antiquated by the 
reformers, though still supported by Cambridge and used in 
the best English schools), Mr. Todhunter* observes that, 
"what appeared singular to persons accustomed to inquiries 
about education, was the readiness of persons to offer advice 
with most imperfect knowledge of the circumstances." We 
may add, that what strikes the latter sort of persons as equally 
singular, is the firm reliance of conservative thinkers like Mr. 
Todhunter, on his acquaintance with these circumstances, not 
merely as affording evidence that existing practices are good, 
or can be made very good without revolution, but that they 
are practically the best. Mr. Todhunter is doubtless right 
in claiming that no text-book in elementary geometry has yet 
been proved superior to Euclid ; but he does not appear to us 
quite justly aware of the disadvantages to which all novelties 
in the trials and experiences (we will not say experiments) 
in education are unavoidably exposed. The very complete 
and elaborate machinery of examinations in the classics and 

* The Conflict of Studies, and other Essays on Subjects connected with Education 
By I. Todhunter, M. A., F. R. S. London, 1873. 



270 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



mathematics, to which Cambridge and the best English 
schools have given so much studious attention, would be want- 
ing to all modern studies, and would need to be devised with 
equal care before the old and new experiences could be fairly 
compared. • 

The main question at issue needs to be cleared of many false 
charges and false arguments, which are as good or as bad on one 
side as the other, before any substantial progress can be made. 
Mr. Todhunter's essays will, no doubt, do service in this way. 
No one could be found in any seat of learning better qualified 
as an expert witness (the capacity in which he appears to pre- 
fer to engage in the discussion, rather than as an advocate). 
A long residence at Cambridge, and much experience in lect- 
uring, and in examinations on mathematical subjects are his 
main qualifications. Intimate acquaintance with the working 
of the machinery of examinations, and with the adaptation of 
mathematical studies to different minds, makes his testimony 
of great value, however little regard may be had for his opin- 
ions expressed as an advocate. It is interesting to find such 
testimony as the following: That the majority of the younger 
students of a university, not distinguished in their school-days 
for mathematical taste and power, have been " either persons 
of ability whose attention was fully occupied with studies differ- 
ent from mathematics, or persons of scanty attainments and 
feeble power, who could do little more than pass the ordinary 
examination. I can distinctly affirm that the cases of hopeless 
failures in Euclid were very few ; and the advantages derived 
from the study, even by men of feeble ability, were most deci- 
ded. In comparing the performance in Euclid with that in 
arithmetic and algebra, there could be no doubt that the Eu- 
clid had made the deepest and most beneficial impression ; in 
fact, it might be asserted that this constituted by far the most 
valuable part of the whole training to which such persons were 
subjected." 

So far as this is testimony to the practicability of mathemat- 
ical studies for all minds, it is valuable. The testimony to 
the value of such studies to those whose abilities are of a 
decidedly different bent from the mathematical may still be 



THE CONFLICT OF STUDIES. 



271 



questioned. Throughout his essays Mr. Todhunter's sole 
standard of value in a university study is that quality in it by 
which the machinery of lectures, text-books, and "pass" and 
competitive examinations, with emoluments and honors, can 
be made of direct assistance to the student. On this standard 
he has a decided preference for the studies of the old curriculum. 
For these, and for advanced modern studies in applied mathe- 
matics, adequate tests of examination, and rewards of assist- 
ance, and honor for success in them are means which are within 
a university's power to devise or command. To lay out courses 
and afford material aids in studies are all that remain of what 
a university can do for a student, unless it is so fortunate at 
times as to secure the services of men of genius (not to be 
reckoned among its ordinary resources), who have the rare 
faculty of stimulating the student to hard work by the interest 
they impart to their teachings. On this ground Mr. Tod- 
hunter seems to us to be strong. It may be justly demanded 
of a university not to think too highly of its resources, and to 
set its machinery aside on occasions in favor of greatly endowed 
teachers. 

It is unfortunately too true, however, that such teachers have 
not always had the genius or sense to know that the excep- 
tion is only properly made in favor of such as themselves. 
They have very frequently shown determined hostility to any 
use of methods which differ from the action of their own sponta- 
neous powers of discipline, and which are really all the poor 
means that a seat of learning can constantly and systematically 
provide. This hostility could be just only if the man of genius 
were endowed with untiring and immortal vigor, or could edu- 
cate by his inspiration a like genius in one or more of his pupils, 
who might then take his place. A natural genius for teaching 
any subject — by which we mean for making the pupil an accu- 
rate and hard worker in it, like his master — is as powerless to 
reproduce itself in a pupil as university examinations are. We 
cannot by examinations, Mr. Todhunter observes, " create 
learning or genius; it is uncertain whether we can infallibly 
discover them ; what we detect is simply the examination-pass- 
ing-power of the candidate." Sir Humphrey Davy said "that 



272 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



his greatest discovery in science was Michael Faraday." 
Genius does not make a genius, but discovers him. Nothing 
more, not so much even, could fairly be expected of the best- 
devised system of examinations. 

"The adaptability of subjects to the exigencies of examina- 
tions" is almost the sole test which our author applies to the 
question of what shall be the course or courses proper to a 
higher general education, although he professes not to lay too 
great stress on this consideration, seeing that it is quite inap- 
plicable to courses arranged for self-training. In regard to 
the value of the natural and experimental sciences this test 
appears to be with him quite decisive, though he thinks, if can- 
didates were few and time ample, effective examinations in 
these subjects might be devised. It appears to us that this 
work falls within the province of a university's duties and is 
made feasible, so far as the number of students seeking honors 
through competitive examinations is concerned, if the univer- 
sity also makes it one of its duties, as our own Harvard has 
done, to lay out various courses, adapted to special classes of 
intellectual tastes. But even if the "examination-values" of 
modern subjects should never be made equal to that of the 
subjects of the old curriculum, this does not justify the univer- 
sity in not making such provision and affording such aids as 
it can for the action of a more genuine motive to study than 
its ordinary machinery seeks to bring into service. It is true 
that, without rigid and just competitive examinations, these 
ulterior motives of emolument and honor could not be fairly 
applied to studies in which they might be of very great ser- 
vice; but modern subjects might in themselves, and not un- 
frequently do, inspire the pupil and exact from him labors in 
a degree comparable to the influence of the most eminent 
teachers. Moreover, proficiency in them is capable of tests 
by teachers who closely follow the student's work, and by 
such original work in written theses as the study may inspire. 
One way in which the more immediate and genuine motive, 
the love of a study, could be made the more efficacious, is not 
to tempt the student away from it by too great rewards for pro- 
ficiency in those studies which have a greater adaptability to 
examinations. 



THE CONFLICT OF STUDIES. 



273 



It is quite natural that the importance of a study as a means 
of general education should be constantly confounded, by one 
with Mr. Todhunter's experience, with what the university can 
do directly in aid of it, or with its " examination-value." Al- 
though it is true that no other studies compare with the mathe- 
matical in the exercise they require, when properly taught, of 
the active powers of intellect, or the inventive and imaginative 
faculties of the mind, yet it is not true that the mind need 
always be in a merely receptive attitude toward such studies 
as history or the natural sciences. Mr. Todhunter admits that, 
in the study of a new language, it is not altogether the recep- 
tive attention that is exercised. His chief objection to other 
studies compared to the mathematical are, however, that they 
afford no problems in their earlier stages ; and, as he adds, " it 
is scarcely conceivable that examination papers in history or 
the natural sciences can offer any tolerable equivalent in merit 
and importance to the problems of mathematics." But it may 
be said, on the other hand, that mathematics offers nothing 
but the most uninviting entertainment to a receptive attention. 
Its truths, independently of the problems they suggest, have a 
weariness even for the adept; while languages, history, and the 
natural sciences, though not exercising the mind with prob- 
lems in the earliest stages of the study, could and should be 
made to do so as soon as the active powers of intellect are 
mature enough. The student may be made to seek for more 
authentic or intelligible evidence both in history and the natu- 
ral sciences than what his text-books afford; or he may be led 
to investigate these subjects by comparing various authorities, 
or by original research; though how he could be effectively 
led in this search by the requisitions of a formal competitive 
examination is not so easily determined. To many thinkers 
on the subject of education this last consideration would only 
tell against the rigidity of the type of competitive examinations, 
which has been developed in Cambridge from the studies of 
the old curriculum and in modern mathematics. 

It is quite true that the great qualities required and devel- 
oped in philosophers by original research in experimental 
sciences are not produced, or even approached, by the repe- 



274 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

tition of their experiments. These, from being the devices ot 
the most vigorous activity of genius, become, in the experi- 
mental lecture-room, or even in the student's own hands in 
the laboratory, comparatively unimproving amusements. It 
is one of the weaknesses of genius to recommend enthusias- 
tically (what is generally quite impracticable) the course by 
which it has manifested itself and reached conspicuous emi- 
nence. Nevertheless we attribute much more value to a first- 
hand acquaintance with experimental processes than our authoi 
appears to do. What he considers as a defect for which " some 
considerable drawback should be made from the educational 
value of experiments, so called," is their failure. This would 
certainly mingle unavoidable accidents confusedly with the 
merits of the student's performance in a set examination ; and 
would, doubtless, disconcert the examining board or teacher, 
as it often has the most skillful lecturers. But these very fail- 
ures have in them an important general lesson, especially use- 
ful in correcting impressions and mental habits formed by too 
exclusive attention to abstract studies, and have also special 
lessons in their respective sciences. From the general lesson 
is derived an adequate appreciation of the difference between 
abstract or conditional theorems in science, and their exhibi- 
tion in concrete phenomena. The difficulty of isolating uni- 
versal and simple principles from modifying and disturbing 
causes in actual experiments gives an impression of the nature 
of physical laws very unlike what the principles of geometry 
might give, when not corrected by such lessons from the failure 
of experiments. The actual circles and straight lines of geom- 
etry are easily made to embody very closely the theorems of 
the science. But this is not their real use. Geometrical dia- 
grams are not specimens or examples of the universal truths 
of the science, but are rather a language — an ideographic lan- 
guage — by which these truths are expressed and inferred. 

It is a curious illustration of the need geometrical studies of 
the Euclidean or ancient type have of guidance from a logic 
especially treating of its methods and limits, that a recent 
English work on Logic, in use in one of our principal universi- 
ties (J evons's "Elementary Lessons in Logic"), should have 



THE CONFLICT OF STUDIES. 



75 



represented geometrical reasoning as a kind of induction, — a 
reasoning from a particular specimen to all other specimens. 
As well might we say that the repetition of the meaning of a 
proposition expressed in words, by expressing it in other words, 
or in the same words, first printed, then spoken, is an induct- 
ive process. It is true, and may explain this confusion, that 
the axioms and postulates of geometry are inductions from ele- 
mentary constructions, real or imagined, which are subse- 
quently used ideographically to express them and their combi- 
nations in the deductions of the science. Mr. Todhunter, in 
his essay on Elementary Geometry, avows himself opposed to 
the study of logic in conjunction with geometry, as of too small 
advantage compared to the addition that would be made to the 
labors of schoolmasters. The mere fact that Euclid expands 
his reasonings into full syllogistic completeness is not reason 
enough, we admit, for requiring additional work by the teacher 
and student in the study of syllogisms, or in the analysis and 
classification of arguments. This amplification of arguments 
was really made by Euclid to simplify, not to add to, the labors 
of students and teachers. But logic in a wider sense — that 
is, some account of what are the self-imposed restrictions of 
resource and method which characterize the ancient geometry 
— would, we believe, be of great service to intelligent students. 
It is to the struggle against these restrictions that the superior 
value of ancient geometry, as a mental discipline, is mainly 
attributed by the best writers. They are like the conditions and 
restrictions imposed on artists and poets in the conventions of 
the fine arts, or on youths as laws of games and athletic sports, 
to which the intellect, the conscience, and honor of youth are 
keenly alive. Such restrictions are in the very spirit of that 
spontaneous ambition for self- formation which characterizes 
the period of discipline; that is, the period from late childhood 
to or beyond middle youth. 

In respect to the special value of experimental practice to 
the comprehension of a science, Mr. Todhunter makes a most 
singular remark, perhaps intended as a humorous one. After 
observing that boys would doubtless delight in such practice, 
as they would in any other physical pursuits, like foot-ball, as 



276 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

compared to mental exertion, he adds concerning the value 
there might be to the boy of seeing with his own eyes the facts 
of science illustrated, that it may be said the youth is thus 
made to believe the fact more confidently; and he then re- 
marks: "I say that this ought not to be the case. If he does 
not believe the statement of his tutor, — probably a clergyman 
of mature knowledge, recognized ability, and blameless char- 
acter, — his suspicions are irrational, and manifest a want of 
the power of appreciating evidence, a want fatal to his success 
in that branch of science which he is supposed to be cultivat- 
ing." The power of appreciating the evidence of testimony 
would doubtless be shown to be deficient in the case supposed, 
or if the boy's belief was what the illustrations of experiment were 
useful in affecting. But the more direct effect of illustration 
is generally supposed to be to aid the understanding and imagi- 
nation. A general statement about matters of which no illus- 
trative or analogous instances have ever come under the stu- 
dent's notice is necessarily vague or even unintelligible, and is 
rather a subject of simple memory (or, so far as belief is con- 
cerned, of simple faith) than of rational comprehension. The 
latter consists in the ability to pass from the general to the 
particular, or from the abstract to the concrete, and to return 
again. This is the ladder of the intellect. Any number of 
formulae, without a training of judgment and imagination by 
facts, any number of facts, without a training of the under- 
standing by assured generalizations actually followed, if not 
originally made by the student, will fail to educate or disci- 
pline the faculty which is, par excellence, the mind. We do not 
set so high an estimate as many do on the value for discipline of 
experimental practice. Only enough of discipline in the actual 
practice of experiments to enable the student to study his text- 
book intelligently seems to us desirable for the purposes of a 
general education, and independently of an ambition or design 
of extending the boundaries of an experimental science. This 
might be accomplished as our author suggests, and as Dr. 
Whewell believed, not by making the study of the facts in 
natural and experimental science a part of the business of a 
school, but rather a part of its recreations. 



THE CONFLICT OF STUDIES. 



277 



• Mr. Todhunter apparently believes that "the amusing" has 
generally very little educational value; and much of what 
others would dignify by the name of "interesting" he seems 
disposed to place in this category. We should discriminate 
here between merely spontaneous and idle amusements and 
those pursuits which, because they happen to be interesting in 
themselves or at the outset, may not on this account be the 
less improving, or employ less energy or concentration of facul- 
ties than those which are hard or austere. Our author doubt- 
less had in mind, however, a class of diversions lying in wait 
for unwary students, and forming inseparable parts of certain 
studies. His type of studies, the mathematical, are certainly 
not amusing. Even their interest to the adept is of a pro- 
foundly serious character. But most studies, besides the math- 
ematical, have tempting by-paths leading from them ; and 
geometry, even, is not without a danger of this sort. Mr. 
Todhunter says : " In my experience with pupils, I learned to 
look with apprehension on any exhibition of artistic skill among 
students of mathematics; for I am sure that it is not a fancy, 
but an actual fact, that such a power was in many cases an 
obstacle to success." This observation is given in illustration 
of the independence of each other of different kinds of observ- 
ing powers. The chemist is not (as a chemist, we should add) 
better qualified than another man to be a botanical observer, 
and the like is true in other dissimilar studies. But there 
is a more instructive application of the author's observation 
on the relations of artistic taste to geometry. The facility 
for drawing appears to be the sole one incident to the study 
of geometry which tempts the student fatally into an attractive 
by-path from the difficult, unattractive road of the science. 
The comparative freedom from diverting attractions is one 
great advantage of mathematical studies, and we think that 
our author's esteem of them on this ground is just ; though he 
appears to us not to distinguish clearly enough between the 
value of difficulty and the quality of irksomeness, which is not 
of the essence of difficulty. In the period of youth and disci- 
pline difficulties are courted and welcomed, and do not neces- 
sarily repel. On the contrary, the true end of disciplinary 



278 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

studies appears to be through habit to secure attractiveness, or 
the character of play for useful, though perhaps at first irksome 
exercises. 

Athletic sports, to which the name "asceticism" was ear- 
liest applied in its secondary sense of improving exercises 
in self-formation, were not disagreeable exercises to the old 
Greeks; and although Mr. Todhunter looks upon their pres- 
ent prevalence in English universities with disfavor, he might 
have drawn from them lessons in the science and art of mental 
education. Even the training of the lower animals is not 
without instruction in this regard. Mathematical power, 
though attainable with more or less effort by nearly every one, 
as our author has testified, is so difficult of attainment, and so 
irksome to some minds, that it may well be doubted whether 
general training or a liberal education ought not to be sought 
in many cases in a different direction. Care should be taken, 
of course, that the tastes opposed to mathematical pursuits 
should not have as their chief the taste for merely amusing or 
diverting pursuits, as they very likely do in most cases. 
Mathematical abilities seem to us strikingly similar in their re- 
lations to education to the faculty of "retrieving" in hunting- 
dogs; notwithstanding that metaphysicians have attempted to 
distinguish with characteristic profundity between the mental 
powers of the lower animals and those of men by calling the 
capacity of the one for improvement in mental power sus- 
ceptibility to training, and that of the other a capacity for 
education. It is a familiar fact to sportsmen, that unless the 
young dog shows a fondness for "fetching and carrying" it is 
almost useless to attempt to teach the accomplishment. For 
though fetching and carrying can always, with sufficient pains, 
be taught, yet the means of doing this also teach a vice which 
makes the faculty almost useless. The dog becomes "hard- 
mouthed" with his game. If an attempt to remedy this fault 
is resorted to by training him to carry anything which it is dis- 
agreeable to hold hard in the mouth, the animal will generally 
give up retrieving rather than the vice. 

It is natural to suppose that the severe training needed to 
develop in some minds even a tolerable degree of proficiency 



THE CONFLICT OF STUDIES. 



279 



in mathematics will have some such effect; a narrowing effect 
similar to what excessive devotion to mathematical pursuits 
produces in minds of greater mathematical ability. "While 
engaged in these pursuits a student is really occupied with a 
symbolical language which is exquisitely adapted for a class 
of conceptions which it has to represent, but which is so far 
removed from the language of common life, that unless care 
be taken to guard against the evil the mathematician is in 
danger of finding his command over the vernacular diminished 
in proportion as he becomes familiar with the dialect of ab- 
stract science." To this testimony of our author on the dis- 
advantage of mathematical training, we may add, that the 
supposed value of mathematics for training habits of accuracy 
is delusive. The accuracy belongs to the science objectively. 
There is no such thing as ambiguity or vagueness in it, or the 
possibility of misleading the student by these defects, except 
by gross carelessness on his part. He either understands 
fully and accurately a proposition, or a step in reasoning, or 
he does not understand it at all. There is in the study no 
discipline in detecting and avoiding the faults inherent in com- 
mon language and in the expressions and reasonings of other 
classes of conceptions. As well might an athlete seek to be- 
come an acrobat by exercises on a wide, even, and guarded 
path. 

Again our author says, "I do not suppose that the candi- 
dates who attain to the highest places in the Mathematical 
Tripos are deficient in knowledge and interest in other sub- 
jects; but I fear that omitting these more distinguished men, 
the remainder frequently betray a rude ignorance in much 
that is essential to a liberal education." But this disadvantage 
is not peculiar to mathematical studies. The concentration of 
a dull mind on any single but extensive study or class of con- 
ceptions (like the legal, for example) is apt to leave it in "rude 
ignorance" of many subjects, some knowledge of which, re- 
tained in the memory, is the sign, rather than the essence, of 
an effective liberal training. What constitutes a liberal educa- 
tion is, as we have said, an unsettled question, or is arbitrarily 
determined by conventional standards, which are less regarded 



280 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

now than formerly. But it obviously has, at least, these two 
general features; namely, an acquaintance with a wide variety 
of subjects, adequate and correct as far as it goes, but neces- 
sarily superficial, or at second hand; and, secondly, such a 
mastery of some one or two subjects in their methods and de- 
tails, as will afford an adequate measure of the knowledge, or 
rather of the ignorance, of the mind, in respect to subjects of 
which it has only a smattering. 

Another disadvantage in mathematical studies, admitted by 
our author, is the deficiency, as a means of discipline, of the 
modern and higher mathematics; a defect which is incident to 
their very perfections. When the perfect symbolism of the 
higher geometry is "cultivated for examination purposes, there 
is the great danger that the symbols may be used as substi- 
tutes for thought rather than as aids to thought." By this we 
suppose is meant that the abridged processes and notations of 
modern geometry make it possible for the candidate to carry 
the theorems and their proofs in mere memory for the most 
part, and without understanding, or without that rational mem- 
ory, to which such symbolism is a true art; so that the exam- 
ination will fail of its end. Yet in abstract subjects all thought 
is by means of symbols ; whether these are the words of com- 
mon language, the comparatively numerous and awkward steps 
in the expression and inference of theorems by the diagrams 
of the old geometry, or the refined, abridged, and effective 
notations of modern mathematics. The latter are substitutes 
for thought to the mathematician who has mastered them, in 
the same sense that a single philosophical term is a substitute 
for a paraphrase or definition. They save useless thought, or 
repetitions of thought when used as instruments of investiga- 
tion, either in pure or applied mathematics; and though the 
thought that is thus avoided may be useful in mere discipline, 
yet it is mainly useful, we should suppose, by serving as a check, 
through an easy transition to intuition, for the guidance of 
reasoned processes, in which the mind still feels insecure. 

The true value of these notations is objective ; or is in that 
which most essentially distinguishes the modern from ancient 
geometry, its direct applicability to other sciences. The an- 



THE CONFLICT OF STUDIES. 2 8i 

cient geometry is no longer to the physical philosopher the 
misleading type it once was, of pure principles, or of rational 
comprehension. It is nevertheless, in one respect, as good a 
discipline as ever in the education of the mind, and is so on 
account of its very defects as an instrument of investigation. 
Its self-imposed restrictions of method adapt it pre-eminently 
to the spirit and uses of discipline. The modern mathematics 
are really as distinct from it in essential characteristics as 
from logic or grammar. Compared to ancient geometry, the 
objective ulterior value, the usefulness, independently of dis- 
cipline, of the modern mathematics is immense. The vari- 
ous branches of exact physical science are closed studies to 
those who have not gained possession of this instrument 
of all exact inquiry. These can only view the outside of 
the temple. "Admission to its sanctuary, and to the priv- 
ileges and feelings of a votary, is only to be gained," as Sir 
John Herschel says of astronomy, "by one means, — sound 
and sufficient knowledge of mathematics." The relative claims 
of this immediate use of a study and of its disciplinary use or 
"examination-value" are chiefly considered by writers on 
education in relation to the limits of time they propose for dis- 
ciplinary studies in general. Mr. Todhunter objects to "the 
continuance of examinations far into the years of manhood," 
and also "regrets to see this discipline commenced at too early 
an age." In the former usage of his university, "when math- 
ematical studies were regarded mainly as a discipline they 
were frequently entirely dropped or indefinitely postponed 
when the period of undergraduate discipline was completed." 
The most eminent scholars were thus sent forth from the uni- 
versities, having made only a tantalizing approach to any di- 
rect use of mathematical skill, and deficient in a knowledge 
which many of them must afterwards have felt to be an essen- 
tial part of a liberal education. 

What we call the objective value of a science is what should 
be meant by calling it "useful knowledge." For if the spe- 
cific utility of any knowledge is not indicated by calling it 
useful, this term can only mean that the value of the knowl- 
edge is not especially in itself, as distinguished from ignorance, 



282 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

error, or stupidity ; or is not the kind of value which a well- 
ascertained but isolated, unrelated fact may yet have as a mere 
fact; such as the number of leaves on a given bush. In the 
acquisition and memory of such facts idiots not unfrequently 
emulate philosophers. The philosopher's advantage is that he 
has the power to select the related or the useful facts and to 
forget the rest. This selection is the prime function of intel- 
lect. The usefulness of knowledge is in its relatedness or 
ulterior value, whether as leading to other and wider ranges 
of knowledge, or as a discipline of the mind, or even as leading 
to "bread and butter." This last utility is what the unqual- 
ified term "useful" generally refers to in common language. 
Hence the objection to its employment. The popular teaching 
of natural and experimental sciences by lectures has in recent 
times been practiced apparently on the ground that they are 
useful in this sense. It is doubtless true that astronomy, 
chemistry, and physics are deserving of honor from the un- 
learned, as well as from scholars, on account of the great 
incidental services (not generally designed or anticipated in 
their pursuit) which they have rendered to the arts of life ; 
or on account of their utility in the narrowest, most destitute 
sense of the word. Wealth and leisure are indispensable 
requisites to the philosopher's and scholar's pursuits; and it. 
may be said that the means by which these are secured for 
their pursuits, in any community, ought to be prominent ob- 
jects of their study and care. Yet, if such had been the 
motives of physical philosophers in their pursuits of such a 
subject as electrics, or magnetism and galvanism, if wider, 
vaguer, less-defined utilities, or relations of knowledge, had 
not been the almost exclusive motives of this pursuit, it is 
almost certain that the many useful applications of electrics 
in the arts would never have been reached. The same is true 
of other branches of physical and natural science and of ap- 
plied mathematics. The utility of non-utilitarian motives (in 
the narrowest sense of the terms) justifies the motives even 
from the lowest grounds. Where it is demonstrable, as we 
might suppose it to be of comparative philology and the science 
of language, that the pursuit can never lead to any such re- 



THE CONFLICT OF STUDIES. 



283 



suits,* and is even deficient in applicability to university exam- 
ination purposes, yet even here the spirit of the pursuit is the 
same as in natural and experimental science, and it is to this 
spirit, rather than to its occasional and incidental services, in 
unforeseen ways, that honor for the service is due. 

Not only the knowledge which has thus been popularly 
honored, but all "useful knowledge," in this wide sense, 
should be fostered by the universities. That which, however, 
needs especially the care of the universities, is the knowledge 
which is not, and does not promise to be, useful in an eco- 
nomical sense ; the pursuit of which is not stimulated by the 
prospects of rewards, in fees or wages, or in any ways propor- 
tionately to the exertion made. "If," says Mill, "we were 
asked for what end, above all others, endowed universities 
exist, or ought to exist, we should answer, 'To keep alive 
philosophy.' " It is, of course, in the devising and working 
of its machinery that the time and energies of the officers of 
a university are chiefly employed ; by which young men are 
helped, encouraged, and tested in their pursuits of culture, and 
are then sent out into the world bettered in ability and char- 
acter by the discipline they have received. " How," it may be 
asked, "can this be a service to philosophy, and to the knowl- 
edge which is useful only in a higher sense ? " " Our obliga- 
tions are to the nation, not to philosophy," the university officers 
might answer. "We are bound to see that the young men 
who come to us become thorough and accurate students of 
whatever studies they pursue, and become prepared for their 
duties in life by the discipline most conducive to accuracy and 
scholarship. The studies best adapted as means to these ends 
are the studies we must foster. We must be able to unmask 
ignorance in our 'pass' examinations; to reveal knowledge 
in our competitive ones; to compare competitors justly and to 
reward the most successful. If the studies chosen for these 
ends are not sufficiently philosophical, then we must sacrifice 
philosophy to our duty to the nation." 

We believe we have not overstated in the above the views, 

* The recognized political value to English rule in India of studies in these sciences 
by European scholars preclude, however, the supposition of even such an exception. 



284 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

and the point of view, of the university men who think at all 
about the subject. Perhaps more attention to the claims of 
philosophy, or of a knowledge for the sake of a higher knowl- 
edge, would have avoided or remedied the defects which Mr. 
Todhunter finds in the Cambridge system of examinations. He 
is disposed apparently to go back to past usages, though he 
sees little to encourage the hope of a return. " In the study 
of mathematics formerly, as a discipline, a general knowledge 
of the principles was all that was required; now," he adds, 
" we insist on a minute investigation of every incidental part 
of a subject. Exceptions and isolated difficulties seem to 
receive undue attention on account of their utility for the 
examiner's purpose." Again he says, "As a general principle 
it may be said that the older practice in education was to aim 
at the discipline of the mind, and that the modern seeks to 
store it with information." And again, " It may be, I think, 
justly charged upon our examinations that the memory is over- 
cultivated and rewarded. As I have already said, examina- 
tions in some subjects, as in languages, for example, must 
necessarily be almost exclusively tests of the memory; but 
what we may regret to see is that in examinations in subjects 
with which the reasoning power is supposed to be mainly con- 
cerned, the memory should be severely taxed." 

On the other hand he repels the charge against the exam- 
ination system that it encourages cramming. This term as 
applied to various practices seems to him to lack any fixed 
definite meaning, other than an implied censure of rigorous 
examinations in general. He conjectures that one definite 
meaning in the word may relate to the tendency in examina- 
tions to over-cultivation and over-appreciation of the memory. 
But he denies that this is a fault or an avoidable one in such 
subjects as language, in which "it would seem, from the nature 
of the case, that the memory must be the principal faculty that 
is tested." Special and exclusive devotion to a single study 
in completing a school-boy's preparation for an examination 
does not appear to him to be properly called cramming, or at 
any rate to deserve the reprobation meant to be conveyed by 
"this absurd and unmeaning word." Mr. Todhunter's repro- 



THE CONFLICT OF STUDIES. 



285 



bation of this word, and of the criticism on examinations in 
general conveyed by its use, is a key to his whole theory of 
education ; or at least defines the position from which his 
observations were made, and by which the bearings and value 
of his testimony should be estimated. There is, it seems to 
us, a slight inconsistency in objecting, as he does, to the value 
of natural and experimental sciences, as a discipline, on ac- 
count of the time and pains needed for examinations in them, 
which he thinks would be excessive; at the same time admit- 
ting in regard to the studies he approves of, that undue atten- 
tion to exceptions and isolated difficulties in them is given on 
account of the utility of these to the examiner's purpose. 
That is, he contrasts two kinds of studies in respect to defects, 
which it appears both would have, but which are really due to 
a system that does not admit, on account of these defects, of 
application to both kinds at once. 

The examiner's purposes, the secondary or subsidiary means 
of discipline, are likely in his pursuit, as means are in all 
other pursuits, to receive undue attention, and the proximate 
means to the true ends to become ends in themselves; espe- 
cially, as we have said, when custom or long usage has sanc- 
tioned them and affords the easiest escape from difficult ques- 
tions. How to make the studies previously found useful in dis- 
cipline still more useful; how to avoid defects in the examina- 
tions, to prevent the memory from doing the proper work of the 
reason in these tests of proficiency; how to prevent the evils, 
whatever they may be, of cramming, are the highest problems in 
education to which university men generally give their attention. 
To them it is a sufficient objection to modern studies as means 
of discipline that they are not fixed or finished sciences, but 
are constantly undergoing changes and improvements at the 
hands of special adepts, which are more fundamental than the 
changes, improvements, and expansions made in older subjects 
solely with reference to their use in education. In short, the 
officers of universities are as innocent of philosophy as most 
other men in business generally are. "The fashionable sub- 
jects of the day" disconcert the examiner. If these are 
capable of inspiring a patient and laborious attention in the 



286 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

student by their own inherent interest, it is well. This is the 
way in which they may be useful, but the professor and the ex- 
aminer with his rewards of assistance and honor have no 
concern in it; or their duties are done by putting the new 
subjects into the highest examination papers. 

The corporate spirit, the conscious union of aims and the 
purposes common to all in such a university, is not a very high 
one. Conservatism, reverence for the traditions of the uni- 
versity, attachment to it as a family of scholars, pride in it 
for the importance of its services to the nation and to mankind, 
are the sum of its conscious virtues, the limits of its aspira- 
tions. If so be philosophy seeks or can find entertainment in 
this family, she is welcome; but is still a guest, not an inmate. 
If it were not for the wealth or the appropriations of it which 
serve to consolidate these as well as other families, it might be 
otherwise. Philosophers were so named because they refused 
the pittances of schoolmasters; but it is difficult to see how 
they could have lived without them, or what was equivalent to 
them (though called by a different name), if they happened 
to be poor, as they generally were. But it is not perhaps by a 
disposal of means essentially different from what now prevails 
in universities, that a remedy for their defects is to be sought. 
It is rather by a different spirit of disposal. In order that the 
distribution of assistance and honors might be perfectly just, a sys- 
tem has been devised which inevitably places inferior motives to 
study in the first rank of incitements. A definite though facti- 
tious direction thus given to the efforts of teachers is the best 
excuse that can be clearly urged for this promotion of inferior 
incitements to study. Comparatively few candidates continue 
throughout their academic course to be stimulated by them, 
the majority being soon distanced; yet these few are those 
who least need or are really profited by such discipline ; while 
the majority have their studies chosen for them on such irrele- 
vant grounds as would be disregarded in a choice of courses 
arranged for self-training, namely, "the adaptability of sub- 
jects to the exigencies of examinations." 

We admit the difficulties of reform, while insisting on its im- 
portance. It is at least one step towards it to recognize this im- 



THE CONFLICT OF STUDIES. 



287 



portance, and to know, however painful the consciousness may- 
be, that our loyalty and pride are not fixed upon the highest 
objects; that a justice which cannot go by favor is yet not the 
greatest justice. It is not the justice of natural families, nor of 
families of philosophers. These may not reach practically a 
very high type; they seek, however, for justice through other 
means than regulations; they love to receive it at the hands of 
honest and intelligent generosity, rather than win it from the 
hands of inflexible law. One would suppose that in a univer- 
sity, if anywhere among men, this dangerous, impracticable 
higher justice might find a seat; but an English university would 
be the last place where one would wisely seek for it. Such is the 
influence of competitive examinations, that the justice of them 
is more hostile to this rival than to any form of injustice. This 
may be because the rival is, in a university, a really formidable 
and dangerous one; so that it becomes the chief business of the 
reigning power to maintain its throne. At any rate Mr. Tod- 
hunter thinks it highly important that the justice of competi- 
tive examinations should be additionally guarded, by exclud- 
ing teachers rigidly from the examinations of their own pupils 
in competition with others. This is indeed a confession of an 
inherent, rather than an incidental weakness in the system. 

That the ends of a liberal education are manifold, and are 
vaguely conceived in their just proportions; that the means to 
the various ends, which may be consciously sought, are often 
conflicting; and that the attention of those who make educa- 
tion their business is definitely directed by a traditional curric- 
ulum to the subsidiary means of perfecting its use, — are perhaps 
sufficient explanations of the feeble attention given by scholars 
to the higher or ultimate ends of training. That our author, 
with all his study and experience in this subject, should have 
failed to discover any definite meaning in the word cramming 
beyond its implied censure of rigorous examinations is, there- 
fore, not surprising. If we may venture to say in a sentence 
what the word commonly means, when used intelligently, we 
may say that a given amount of studious attention, either 
rational or merely mnemonic, given to a subject exclusively 
and for a short time, gives to the mind a different and a less 



2 88 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

persistent or valuable hold on the subject than the same" 
amount and kind of attention spread over a longer time and 
interrupted by other pursuits. This mode of study and its de- 
fects are what we conceive the word cram is meant to express, 
and at the same time to censure. 

All modes of study involve, of course, repetitions of such 
degrees of attention to a fact or conception or inference as 
the student's power can command. By these repetitions 
the memory is made firm and persistent. But there are two 
very different modes of repetition: first, by repeated acts of 
direct attention; secondly, by repeated recalls or recollections. 
The latter has two varieties, namely, being repeatedly re- 
minded by associated thoughts or objects of the things re- 
membered, and performing repeated acts of voluntary recol- 
lection or research in reminiscence. The last is the only active 
exercise of memory, and is, of course, most strengthening to a 
co?nmand of memory. But both these varieties, and especially 
the latter, require, for disciplinary exercise and trial, interposed 
intervals and diversions of attention; and the longer the inter- 
vals are, if not too long, the more the essential or rational, and 
the far-reaching or constructive associations of thought come 
into- play, or the more the "reason" is cultivated, according 
to the common expression of this practically well-known fact. 
The reason is a slow growth, and cannot be forced in any 
study, though in some it may readily be blighted. 

There is a popular opinion, shared by some philosophers, 
that great memory and sound judgment are incompatible, and 
the words Beati me??ioria expectantes judicium express this 
supposed incompatibility. And there is a basis, doubtless, for 
this belief. The more essential or rational and the far-reach- 
ing or constructive associations of thought are by far the most 
durable, and constitute the inner life, or sub-conscious action 
of thought; though the associations which are temporarily 
stronger are most readily commanded, or are parts of the pres- 
ent volitional power of the mind. In other words, the reten- 
tiveness of memory as distinguished from recollection, or from 
the power of ready recall, depends on the thoroughness of un- 
derstanding, or on the number of links of mental habitude 



THE CONFLICT OF STUDIES. 



289 



binding together and leading to the things remembered. The 
apparent contradiction, which Sir W. Hamilton regards as a 
real one, between the great learning of the philosophic scholar, 
Joseph Scaliger, and his statement that he had not a good 
memory but a good reminiscence, that proper names did not 
easily recur to him, but when thinking on them he could find 
them out, is a good illustration of the distinction between the 
readiness of a sensuous or first-hand memory by rote, and the 
more durable memory of a reflective and subtle understanding, 
which involves a greater real command with sufficient pains, 
though not so ready a command of remembered objects. There 
was no real inconsistency between Scaliger's confession and 
his great learning, or even the readiness of his memory on 
occasions. His own testimony is worth much more about his 
own memory than any contemporary's judgment from his talks, 
such as Sir W. Hamilton quotes in his Metaphysics (Lecture 
XXX). Reminiscence appears to have been used by him in 
the sense of a power of attention to recover what did not readily 
recur to him, and ought in this sense to be distinguished both 
from mere retentiveness and from readiness of recollection ; 
the latter being the sense in which he used the word memory. 
But so far are sound judgment and memory, in a wider sense 
than this, from being incompatible, that judgment is in fact a 
form of memory, — the most subtle and serviceable, though 
least readily commanded. It is the memory or the retentive- 
ness of understanding, or of the generalizing faculty ; just 
as what is commonly called memory is the retentiveness of 
imagination, or of the faculty of individual and concrete 
representations. The soundness or excellence of both forms 
depends, of course, on the powers of attention and primary 
perception. 

"That the memory is over cultivated and rewarded" by the 
incitements and exactions of examinations in Cambridge is 
what Mr. Todhunter admits. That this is due to the mode of 
study they encourage is what he has failed to see. The abuse 
to which examinations are liable of testing memory when the 
faculty of reason is the one under examination is a fault which 
Mr. Todhunter, as an examiner in mathematics, has seen, and 
13 



290 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



against which he believes the examinations can and should be 
guarded ; and it is not, therefore, he thinks, one which ought 
to condemn the system. And so far we go along with him, 
but the real defect of the system is subtler than this. 

Examinations may be guarded against mistaking a simple 
memory of the lowest order, or mere memory, for a rational 
comprehension of a subject ; but the faculties trained by men- 
tal discipline are not so simply classified as writers on educa- 
tion appear to think when they enumerate them as memory, 
reason, and invention or imagination. There are various kinds 
and orders of memory, and the highest of these, together with the 
highest order of invention, involves the faculty called reason. 
The faculties which ought to be tested by examination are 
properly memory and invention in their various orders, and in 
the kinds in which various studies have disciplined them. Ex- 
aminations in languages and history are mainly tests of mem- 
ory, Mr. Todhunter thinks ; but how different are the orders 
of memory involved even in these! How different is the child's 
memory of stories from that of a student of comparative my- 
thology! A quick, retentive child's memory will note every 
variation in repeated recitals of a tale, and will correct the 
story-teller on points which seem to the adult mind quite trivial, 
but are in fact to the child essential enough to make a different 
story. When the comparative mythologist, on the other hand, 
finds identity amidst the varieties of legendary tales of various 
races and nations, his memory of them is of a different order 
from the child's. History or language may be remembered in 
these different ways, and no system of competitive examinations 
would be able to detect the difference. A difficult construc- 
tion in an author writing in an ancient or a foreign language 
might be satisfactorily construed by the candidate either because 
he retained in simple memory, as an isolated fact, the explana- 
tion of it given by his tutor (which might be more rational 
than the student could gather from a literal translation), or be- 
cause he had, like his tutor, met and noted parallel or analo- 
gous constructions in the same or in other authors ; thus exer- 
cising his reason in a still better way. How vastly superior, 
indeed, the latter form of memory is, in persistency, in utility 



THE CONFLICT OF STUDIES. 291 

for professional employments, and in the satisfaction of thought 
itself as a mental exercise! If this cannot be distinguished by 
formal examinations from lower orders of memory, the fact 
ought to tell against the system rather than against those 
studies which are ill-adapted to it, and which include almost all 
except mathematical studies ; or even include these when the 
system is not elaborated to the perfection it now has in Cam- 
bridge. 

A broad distinction in the kinds of mental association, dom- 
inant in different orders of memory, is familiar to psychologists, 
though apparently not to most writers on education. The as- 
sociations of mere contiguity or consecutiveness are character- 
istic of the child's mind and of imaginative poetical persons. 
A low order of invention goes along with them, namely, the 
order of poetical or artistic invention, which is intellectually in- 
ferior, and is not cultivated systematically by universities, al- 
though valuable to the artist or poet, and highly influential in 
works of genius. If the memory dependent on this kind of as- 
sociation is naturally strong, and continues after childhood 
with but little systematic practice or effort, it may be regarded 
as a positive advantage to the mind, as a form of native 
strength; though the exercises and mental habits required for 
the cultivation of it are directly opposed to those needed for 
the cultivation of the higher or rational memory and invention. 
Committing pages of rhythmical verses or simple elegant prose 
to memory, though not exclusively dependent on associations 
of the lowest order, yet depends very largely on them, and in- 
terferes as a habit with the habits which bring into play the 
other kind of associations which psychologists have distin- 
guished, namely, the associations of similarity. This kind of 
associations brings together resembling, analogous, or identical 
parts in different trains of contiguous or consecutive impres- 
sions, or drops from these trains into oblivion all the parts that 
have not with the rest ties of this sort, or else the contrasted 
ones of ^similarity. The associations of similarity are those 
of rational comprehension in memory and invention. They 
dissolve the ties of the other sort, which are relatively so strong 
in children, in natural arithmeticians, and often in the unde- 



292 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

veloped minds of idiots. The two sorts rarely exist together 
in great perfection, or except in men of eminent genius, whose 
native powers of attention are equal to those of two ordinary- 
minds. 

Hence for minds which schools and universities undertake 
to train, the needed discipline is not the training of two dis- 
tinct and unrelated faculties (the memory and reason), by 
studies specifically chosen to test their proficiency ; but it is 
the supplementing of a lower and original, or early developed 
form of memory and invention by a higher one, even at the 
expense of supplanting the lower in great measure. In the 
most rational of studies, the mathematical, the constituents 
which depend on mere memory, or the lowest kind of associa- 
tion, are the fewest, and the play of invention, in the construct- 
ive action of rational imagination, is the greatest. Perhaps 
the latter is too great for a symmetrical training of the mind ; 
since, in a genuine pursuit of mathematics, the lower form of 
memory is apt with ordinary minds to be enfeebled by it. The 
lower form of memory is still a very valuable one ; though the 
cheapness of books and writing-materials dispenses with many 
of its services. Even cramming, or the getting up of a subject 
in the shortest time, which depends largely on powers of reten- 
tion of this sort, and but little on the fixed habits formed by 
studies more prolonged, might on this ground be commended; 
though cramming mathematics for examination would obvi- 
ously not be the best course; since other studies, pursued 
properly, would more directly and profitably exercise these 
powers, by the concentration of attention. 

The ability to " cram," which such work in the universities 
must, of course, cultivate, has been thought to be an element 
of success in various pursuits of life, as with the statesman, 
the general, the lawyer, and with men of business ; but we are 
inclined to believe that the use in these pursuits of the lower 
form of memory is secured to successful men by their ability 
to stimulate its action on occasions by throwing into it their 
superior energies of purpose, emotion, or will, rather than by 
university practice of this sort. Light is thrown on this sub- 
ject by the well-known facts in psychology, that the lower 



THE CONFLICT OF STUDIES. 293 

memory depends on two distinct causes, on the repetition and 
on the intensity of impressions; and that impressions which 
are at all relevant to states of strong emotion are more deeply 
and persistently impressed than under ordinary circumstances. 
Even trivial, irrelevant circumstances attending or coming 
under our notice in states of strong emotion are long retained 
in the memory. If this be the true explanation of the great 
service which the lower memory sometimes renders to eminent 
minds, it would follow that it is not by the direct cultivation of 
the memory, but rather by cultivating this cause of it that 
discipline can be useful; that is, by exercises which stimulate 
to energetic action the emotions and the will. Athletic train- 
ing and exercises are of this sort, and though they do not 
employ the memory, may yet, by the sustained mental effort 
required in them, educate the character to a better command 
of memory on fitter occasions. No faculty is in general more 
susceptible of training than that of attention in the directions 
in which it is spontaneous ; and, on the other hand, no faculty 
is more dependent on the native aptitudes and powers which 
direct it. The antithesis is due to the extreme generality of 
the term "attention," which includes in its meaning both the 
original or spontaneous powers of the mind, and those which 
discipline is capable of perfecting or improving with reference 
to any standard. Much of the superiority of eminent minds 
is, doubtless, in a native or early acquired degree and kind of 
power of attention, which none of the motives of direct disci- 
pline can create. This is true also of the lower animals; 
superior native or spontaneously acquired powers of atten- 
tion being regarded by their trainers as indispensable to suc- 
cess in training them. Of this contrast between genius or 
native character and ordinary mental ability, genius itself is 
not in general made aware by comparison with ordinary stand- 
ards, but usually attributes its success to a prolonged and 
patient concentration of an ordinary attention, which is merely 
voluntary ; thus converting into a merit, or a moral superior- 
ity, what are really gifts of nature. But in this explanation 
of itself neither genius nor character takes account of the 
motives or the pleasures of action and effort which make 



2 94 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

patient labor and sacrifice easier for it than for inferior orders 
of minds, for whom moral incitements and rewards are, there- 
fore, more needed ; and genius is apt to take no account of the 
finer quality of its powers of attention, which it attributes to 
the objects or the occasions to which its efforts are "accident- 
ally directed." The pre-eminence of genius and of native 
character is really manifested in the equality of abilities to 
exceptionally difficult works; though it is made indubitably 
evident and a subject for fame and history only in performance 
which admits of comparison with the results of ordinary abili- 
ties. 

Command of the lower memory is doubtless improved by 
the mastery of some one or two subjects; the more special 
and narrow they are, the better, perhaps, for saving time, and 
even if they do not belong to what is commonly accounted 
essential to a liberal education. It should, however, be such 
a mastery as is conducive to the formation of mental habits, 
and not such as can be compassed by cramming, or the exclu- 
sive study of any subject for a special purpose and in a limited 
time. A young officer of the Union army in our late struggle, 
in a letter written on the evening before the battle in which 
his life was sacrificed, attributed his previous successes, and 
rapid promotion to responsible duties, to a six months' study 
of turtles at the Zoological Museum of Harvard University, 
which was undertaken merely from the youthful instinct of 
mastery, or appreciation of the value of discipline, and was 
interrupted by the breaking out of the war and the young 
man's enlistment in the service. Perhaps, however, the inde- 
pendence of character which determined this choice of means 
for discipline was the real source of the success which the 
youth too modestly attributed to the discipline itself. 

It is all-important in considering the problems of education 
to have clearly before our minds what are its true ends and its 
most direct proximate means. This is far more important, in 
a philosophical consideration of the subject, than any amount 
of evidence on the working of a system of subsidiary means 
supposed to be adapted to ends very ill understood. It is a 
far more important question than that to which answer i> made 






THE CONFLICT OF STUDIES. 



2 95 



in the testimony of experienced teachers and examiners as to 
the value of any system of examinations for testing a youth's 
"examination-passing-power." This testimony may be good 
evidence that a university is really doing, and doing faithfully, 
what it professes to do ; but it is not a proof that its system 
is the best, or that its ideas of a liberal education are soundly 
based either in experience or philosophy. It is not a proof 
that philosophy is kept alive in such a university, even to the 
degree of inspiring a hope for attainment beyond the immedi- 
ately, practicable, or of creating any desire for a wider range 
of influence, or for a more comprehensive knowledge of its 
duties. 



THE USES AND ORIGIN OF THE ARRANGE- 
MENTS OF LEAVES IN PLANTS.* 

In proposing to treat in this paper of the origin of some ot 
the more common arrangements of leaves and leaf-like organs 
in the higher orders of plants, I do not intend to make this 
question the principal object of discussion, but propose only to 
consider it so far as it affords useful hypotheses for the inter- 
pretation of some of the obscurer features in the main object 
of this inquiry; namely, questions of the uses of these arrange- 
ments, or of their adaptations to the outward economy of the 
plant's life, and to the conditions of its existence. If by such 
a discussion hypothesis can be made to throw light on physio- 
logical questions, while seeking more directly to connect in a 
continuous series the simpler and more general with the more 
specific and complicated forms in vegetable life, it will gain for 
itself a much greater interest and value than it would other- 
wise possess. It is, indeed, in this value of the principle of 
Natural Selection, its value and use as a working hypothesis, 
that its principal claim to respect consists. If any subsidiary 
hypothesis under the theory serve only as a principle of con- 
nection, a thread on which we may arrange and more clearly 
regard relationships that are the objects of a more promising 
scientific inquiry, it will at least serve a useful purpose, and 
even, perhaps, give greater plausibility to the theory in general 
of the origin of organic forms through the agency ot their 
utilities, or through the advantages these have given to surviv- 
ing forms of life. 

There is hardly any animal or plant, especially of the higher 

*From the Memoirs of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Communicated 
October 10, 1871. 



ARRANGEMENT OF LEAVES. 297 

orders, that has not in many of the characteristics of its struct- 
ure very conspicuous adaptations to the outward conditions of 
its life,^to " the part it has to play in the world," or at least to 
the many values or advantages it has to secure. This fact has 
led many naturalists, whose opinion, until lately, and for a long 
time, has prevailed, to regard a living structure as principally, 
if not entirely, made up of subordinate parts or organs which 
exist for specific purposes, or are essentially concerned with 
special services to the general life of the organism, or even to 
life external to it, the general life of the world, or ultimately 
even to the highest and best life of the world. This doctrine 
deprived of its grander features, as the doctrine of Final Causes 
in natural history, and limited simply to the conception of the 
parts and characters of organic structures as all, or nearly all, 
related essentially to the preservation and continuance of the 
life itself which they embody, or to the principle of self-con- 
servation, is the ground of the importance claimed for the 
principle of Natural Selection in the generation of organic 
species. But another school of naturalists, whose influence has 
been steadily gaining ground, has always strenuously opposed 
this view, and questioned the validity of the induction on 
which it rests. Though it is true that the higher animals and 
plants exhibit a great many special adaptations to the condi- 
tions of their existence, yet, it is objected, in a far greater 
number of characteristics they, in common with the rest of the 
organic world, exhibit no such adaptations. In those most 
important features of organic structures, which are now called 
genetic characters, and were formerly called affinities, few or 
no specific uses can in general be discovered; and it is consid- 
ered unphilosophical to base an induction on the comparatively 
few cases of this class of characters which have obvious utilities 
It is thought unphilosophical to presume on such meagre 
grounds that all these characters are either now, or have been, 
of service to the life of the organism ; thus confounding these 
genetic characters with those that are properly called adaptive. 
By positing this distinction of genetic and adaptive characters 
as a fundamental and absolute one, the theory of organic types 
opposes itself to the conception of utility as a property of 



298 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



organic structures in general, and conceives, on the other hand, 
that an organism consists essentially of certain constituent 
parts and characters which are of no service to its general life, 
and are ends, so far as we can know, in themselves; though 
other and subordinate ones may stand incidentally in this me- 
nial relation. 

This contrast being a merely speculative difference of opin- 
ion, a reference to it, in a scientific inquiry, would be out of 
place were it not that scientific inquiries are almost never free 
from such biases. These almost always exert an unperceived 
influence, unless specially guarded against; and in calling at- 
tention here to this question in biological philosophy, it is only 
for the purpose of characterizing it as a strictly open question. 
As is so often the case in such debates, both sides are right and 
both wrong; right, so far as each refuses credence to the other's 
main and exclusive position, and wrong, so far as each claims 
it for its own. In other words, they are not properly inductive 
theories, awaiting and subject to verification, but arrogant dog- 
mas, demanding unconditional assent. The bearing of this 
debate on the proper questions of science relates only to ??iethod, 
or to what are the directions in which scientific pursuit and 
hypothesis are legitimate. It is oftener by diverting or mis- 
directing scientific pursuit than in any other way that such 
speculative opinions are of serious importance; and in this 
way they are purely mischievous. The theory of types is un- 
doubtedly right in refusing assent to the doctrine, as an estab- 
lished induction, that every part, arrangement, or function of 
an organism is of some special, though it may be unrecognized, 
service to its life; but it is wrong in assuming, on the other 
hand, that all attempts at discovering uses which are not pres- 
ent or obvious must be futile ; or, in assuming that there are 
characteristic features in all organisms, which are not only ar 
present of no use, but never could have been grounds of 
advantage. Again, the theory of the essential reference of 
every feature of an organism to the conditions of its existence 
is undoubtedly right in refusing assent to this assumption of 
essentially useless forms, and in affirming the legitimacy of 
inquiries concerning the utility of any feature whatever to the 



ARRANGEMENT OF LEA VES. 



299 



life of an organism, however far removed in appearance from 
any relations to its present conditions of existence. It is 
wrong, on the other hand, in confounding the legitimacy of 
this pursuit with the dogma in which, as a theory, it essentially 
consists, or in assuming as an established induction what is 
only a legitimate question or line of inquiry. 

It is obvious, however, that a proper scientific judgment of 
these theories cannot be absolutely impartial, since one of them 
is opposed to scientific pursuit, and the other invites it. The 
theory of types, assuming that utility is only a superficial or in- 
cidental character, and not a property of organic forms and 
functions generally, occupies a negative and forbidding attitude 
towards what are really legitimate questions of science; and, 
from this point of view, judgment must be made in favor of the 
rival dogma. We ought to be on our guard, moreover, against 
this theory, since there is a strong natural, but erroneous and 
mischievous, tendency in the mind to fall back upon it from the 
difficulties of a baffled pursuit; and to regard as really ultimate 
those facts of which the causes and dependences elude our 
researches. This resort can never be justified so long as there 
remain any suggestions of explanation not altogether frivolous, 
or incapable of some degree of verification. We may safely 
•maintain that this tendency to rest from the difficulties of 
scientific pursuit is the chief cause of the prevalence at the 
present time of the doctrine, which, when first propounded, 
was regarded as heterodox and dangerous, especially as it then 
seemed opposed to the doctrine of Final Causes. This appar- 
ent opposition has since, however, been made to disappear by 
a modification of the latter doctrine, which has incorporated 
in it this theory of types, by representing a type of structure 
as an ultimate feature in the general plan of creation, or as an 
end for which the successive manifestations and the adapta- 
tions' of life exist, or to which they tend. According to this 
doctrine, it is not for the sake of the maintenance and contin- 
uance of the mere life, such as it is, or such as it can be, under 
the conditions of its existence, that adaptations exist in organ- 
isms; but it is for the sake of realizing in it certain predeter- 
mined special types of structure, which are ends in themselves, 



3°° 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



and to which the adaptive characters of the structure are 
subservient. Thus an elaborate and formidable philosophical 
theory has grown up, which stands in direct and forbidding 
opposition to such inquiries as the one proposed in this discus- 
sion. 

If the theory were true, it would, indeed, be idle to ask 
what are the uses, and how could these have determined the 
origin of those special leaf arrangements in the higher plants, 
which have been observed by botanists, and discussed by 
mathematicians in the theory of Phyllotaxy. There is a suffi- 
ciently obvious utility in the general character of these 
arrangements with reference to the general external economy 
of vegetable life and the functions of leaf-like bodies ; but this 
does not at first sight appear to regard the particular details, or 
the special laws of arrangement, with which the theory of 
Phyllotaxy is concerned. In these we have apparently reached 
ultimate features of structure, the origin or value of which in 
the plant's life it would, on the theory of types, be idle to seek. 
These are such excellent examples of what the theory of types 
supposes to be finalities in biological science, that botanists and 
mathematicians, with hardly an exception, have consented to 
regard them in this light. There is a difference of opinion, it is 
true, as to whether the several angular intervals between succes- 
sive leaves around the stem, or the several angles of divergence 
between successive leaves in the spiral arrangements, ought to 
be regarded as modifications of a single typical angle to which 
they approximate in value, or as several distinct types. There 
is no difference of opinion, however, in regard to another dis- 
tinction of types in leaf arrangements, which, to all appearance, 
are separated by entirely distinct characters; namely, the 
so-called spiral arrangements and those of the verticil or whorl. 
It is with the former chiefly that the mathematical theory 
of Phyllotaxy is concerned. The latter, or the verticil arrange- 
ments, though presenting a great variety of forms, are so 
obviously all of the same general and simple type, that they 
present no difficulties or problems for the exercise of mathe- 
matical skill. Their varieties consist simply in the number of 
leaves in the whorl. From two leaves placed oppositely, these 



ARRA NGEMENT OF LEA FES. 3 1 

whorls vary through all numbers to very large ones, and in all 
these varieties the simple law holds that the leaves of succes- 
sive whorls, being of the same number and placed in each 
whorl at equal distances around the stem, like the spokes of a 
wheel, are so disposed that the leaves of the upper whorl stand 
directly over the angular spaces between those of the lower 
one. These features of arrangement are so obviously the same 
adaptations as those we shall find in the more complicated 
spiral arrangements, that I will consider them both together. 
They appear to be two solutions of the same problem in the 
economy of the higher vegetable life ; though it is probable 
that the whorl arrangement is the inferior one. It approaches 
in simplicity most nearly to the alternate system among the 
spiral forms, though it is perfectly distinct from this. An 
opposition of leaves in the whorl is an accident or trivial 
circumstance dependent on the fact that the number of leaves 
in the whorl is in many cases an even one; while in the alter- 
nate arrangement this opposition is an essential character. 
This would not be strictly the case, indeed, if the theory were 
true that the alternate as well as the other spiral arrangements 
are only modifications of a single typical one. But an exami- 
nation of the evidence will show very slight grounds for this 
opinion. No doubt, in the doctrine of development, all these 
arrangements must be considered as modifications of some 
single ancient form, though this, it is quite likely, was very 
different from the typical arrangement, or the perfect form, in 
the theory of Phyllotaxy. The important point, however, to 
be considered here, is, that on the theory of development there 
is properly no genetic connection between the opposition of 
leaves in whorls and those of the alternate arrangement. And, 
indeed, in the three-leaved systems of the two types the con- 
trast is very marked; for the three leaves of such a whorl 
stand over the angular spaces between the three of the whorl 
below it, as in other arrangements of this type; while the 
three leaves of the spiral system or cycle stand severally 
directly over the three below them. The genetic relationships 
of the two great types will be specially considered when we 
come to the problem of the origin of both from simpler vege^ 
table forms. 



3 o2 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

The names "system" and "cycle" are not so properly ap- 
plicable to groups of leaves in the spiral arrangements as to 
those of whorls, and refer rather to abstract numbers, counted 
from any point we please, than to actually definite groups. 
The actual system, cycle, or group in these arrangements is of 
indefinite extent, or comprises the whole stem, so far as it is 
developed, and even extends into the undeveloped leaves of 
the terminal bud. In speaking of a cycle of leaves in these 
arrangements no definitely situated group is meant, but only a 
definite number counted from any one we may choose for an 
origin. In almost all arrangements of this type we find that, 
after thus counting some definite number of leaves from some 
one assumed as the first, we arrive next at a leaf which stands 
directly over the first. Such a group, so determined, makes 
what is called a cycle; or, as we may sometimes prefer to call 
it, a system. Within it leaves succeed each other at suc- 
cessively greater and greater heights, and are so placed around 
the stem that the same angular interval or angle of divergence 
is contained between any two successive ones. This angle of 
divergence is commensurate with the circumference, but is not 
always an aliquot part of it, as in the angular interval of the 
leaves of whorls. It is in many plants some multiple of an 
aliquot part, and in counting the leaves successively through 
the cycle, we have to turn several times around the stem. 
This number of revolutions, divided by the number of leaves 
in the cycle, is the ratio of the angle of divergence to the 
whole circumference; and the fraction expressing this ratio is 
used to denote the particular arrangement of such a system. 
Thus the fraction \ denotes the alternate arrangement, in 
which there are two leaves in one turn, the third leaf falling 
over the first. \ is the name of the three-leaved system, in 
which there are three leaves in one turn, the fourth falling over 
the first, -f is the name of the system in which five leaves 
occur in two turns and the sixth falls over the first. In order 
that such definite numerical systems, or cycles, should exist in 
the leaves of any plant, it is only necessary that the ratio of 
the angle of divergence to the circumference should be some 
proper fraction, and this fraction would be in the same way 



ARRANGEMENT OF LEA VES. 303 

the name of the system. But any proper fraction whatever 
would have the property I have pointed out; namely, that 
after the number of leaves denoted by its denominator, and 
the number of turns denoted by its numerator, the next suc- 
ceeding leaf would fall over the first. Whatever may be the 
purpose or advantage of the spiral arrangement, and of this 
feature in it, it is obvious that some other purpose is sought, or 
some other advantage gained, by the actual arrangements of 
this sort in nature ; or else it would appear on the theory of 
types, that the typical properties of them are not fully deter- 
mined by what we have yet observed respecting them. For, 
although there is a great variety of such arrangements, these 
do not include all the possible ones, nor even all the simplest. 
There must still be another principle of choice besides what 
determines the rational fraction and the spiral arrangement. 
What this is, is the problem of the mathematical theory of 
Phyllotaxy. The result of this investigation was a classifica- 
tion of all the fractions that occur in natural arrangements 
under the general form of the continued fraction 

1 

a + 1 

1 + &c, 

in which a may have the values, 1, 2, 3, or 4. The successive 
approximations of these four continued fractions give four 
series of proper fractions, which include all the arrangements 
that occur in nature. These series are for 

a = * hhh *,-■&, &c. 

* = 2 h h h i , A &c. 

a = 7. - 1 ,1 I.J a_ &c 

O 3' 4' T 11' 18' ^^' 

«-* •. h'h f>A.A. ** 

The first series is not usually given, since they are the com- 
plei.'jents of the fractions of the second series, and express the 
sarr>e arrangements, but in an opposite direction around the 
circumference; or by supposing that the spiral line connecting 
the leaves is drawn from leaf to leaf the longer way round. 
Omitting then the first series, we shall still have in the others, 
as they stand, developed to five terms, many more fractions 



304 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

than have actually been observed, or could be observed in 
actual plants. 

I propose in what follows to subject the mathematical in- 
duction expressed by these series to careful critical exam- 
ination, to distinguish what is matter of actual observation 
from what is deduced from theory, and to ascertain with pre- 
cision the amount of inductive evidence on which the theory 
of the typical angle rests. Pursuing the subject afterwards by 
a strictly inductive investigation, I shall estimate what there is 
of truth in the theory. This will lead, I think, to the rejection 
of the theory as it stands, or under the form of the typical 
angle, but will not render the observation on which it depends 
wholly nugatory. On the contrary, it will show that this ob- 
servation really leads to the true explanation of the occurrence 
of only certain fractions in the spiral arrangements, and the 
more frequent occurrence of some of them than of others. It is 
a. well-known property of the fractions of these series, that 
after the first two in each, the others can be deduced from the 
preceding ones, and continued indefinitely, by a very simple 
process. The numerator of each after the first two is equal to 
the sum of the numerators of the two preceding, and its de- 
nominator to the sum of their denominators. This law, as a 
matter of observation, was actually discovered only in the first 
four fractions of the first or second series, which are by far the 
commonest of actually observed arrangements in nature. 
Other less frequently occurring fractions were arranged on the 
same principle, and extended so as to give the last two series. 
The four series, or the three lower, ones,, contain, therefore, 
more than all the fractions tha.t are known, to. belong to natural 
arrangements. This will be sufficiently evident when we ob- 
serve that the fractions J and -^ in the first series, or their 
complements, -J and -^-, in the second series, would be indis- 
tinguishable in actual measurement; since they differ frum each 
other by jfa, or by less than a hundredth, which is much less 
than can be observed, or than stems are often twisted by irreg- 
ular growth. For the same reason we must reject all but the 
first three terms of the third and fourth series as being distin- 
guishable only in theory. We are thus left with a very slight 



ARRANGEMENT OF LEA VES. 



3°5 



basis of facts on which to erect the superstructure of theory. 
We shall see further on a still more cogent reason for calling in 
question the validity of this induction; namely, that limiting 
the evidence as we are thus obliged to do, we have still left so 
large a number of actually observed arrangements, that they 
include almost all that are possible among equally simple and 
distinguishable fractions within the observed limits of natural 
arrangements; all, in fact, but two; namely, the fractions ^ 
and -|. The range is not a narrow one, but extends from ^ to 
-J, or from £ to J, since the fractions above J are complements 
of those below, and express the same arrangements, but in an 
opposite direction around the circumference. The problem of 
Phyllotaxy, therefore, seems at first sight to be reduced to 
this; not why the other fractions do occur in nature, but why 
these two do not? But to answer the latter question is really 
also to answer the former, though it will go but very little way 
towards justifying the theory of the typical or unique angle. 
It will go much further if we exclude from this list of fractions 
those which are of very infrequent occurrence, namely, those 
peculiar to the third and fourth series; or, in other words, take 
account of the relative frequency in nature of the several 
arrangements. This, indeed, entirely changes the aspects of 
the question, for we find that, instead of two, there are six frac- 
tions of the simpler denominations (or within the limits of 
distinguishable values), which either do not occur in nature at 
all, or occur very rarely; while those that are common are four 
in number, or less than half of all. But we shall find that 
those of the six which occur rarely differ from the two really 
unique ones among them, and agree with the common ones in 
respect to the law on which the answer to our question really 
depends. This answer will be found to depend on the law 
which was observed in the first four fractions of the first or 
second series, and was extended in the continuation of these 
and the formation of the others. This law, or the dependence 
of these fractions on each other, was seen to be a simple case 
of the relations of dependence in the successive approxima- 
tions of continued fractions, and thus led to the induction of 
these fractions; namely, the continued fraction 



3 o6 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



i -f & c - f° r ^e first series, or i 

T + V 

I + &c. 
for the second. The ultimate values of these continued frac- 
tions extended infinitely are complements of each other, as 
their successive approximations are, and are in effect the same 
fraction; namely, the irrational or incommensurate interval 
which is supposed to be the perfect form of the spiral arrange- 
ment. This does, in fact, possess in a higher degree than any 
rational fraction the property common to those which have been 
observed in nature; though practically, or so far as observation 
can go, this higher degree is a mere refinement of theory. 
For, as we shall find, the typical irrational interval differs from 
that of the fraction ■§ (and its complement differs from -§-) by 
almost exactly 10 7 q , a quantity much less than can be observed 
in the actual angles of leaf-arrangements. The conception of 
such a typical angle as an actual value in nature, and as a 
point of departure for more specialized ones, existing either 
among the normal patterns, or formative principles of vegeta- 
ble life, as the theory of types supposes, or in some unknown 
law of development or physiological necessity, — such a con- 
ception is a very attractive one. And as exhibiting in the 
abstract and in its most perfect form a property peculiar, as we 
shall see, to natural arrangements, but belonging to them in 
inferior and in various degrees, — as exhibiting this separated 
from the property which such arrangements also have, by 
which they are divisible into limited systems or cycles, — from 
this point of view the conception acquires a valid scientific 
utility. But we should be on our guard against a misconstruc- 
tion of it. There is no evidence whatever, and there could he 
none from observation, that any such separation of properties 
actually occurs in nature, or that one is superposed on the 
other in successive stages of development in the bud, or that 
this typical arrangement is first produced and subsequently 



ARRANGEMENT OF LEA VES. 307 

modified into the more special ones, — into the limited systems 
or cycles represented by simple rational fractions. To suppose 
this is to confound abstractions with concrete existences, and 
would be an instance of the so-called " realism " in science, 
against which it is always so necessary to be on our guard. 
There is no reason to suppose that one rather than the other 
of these properties appears first in the incipient parts of the 
bud, or that either exists in any degree of perfection before the 
•development of these parts has made considerable advance. 

[The memoir proceeds to show by "a strictly inductive investigation," 
and to exemplify graphically by a large diagram, "what this property is 
which the typical or unique angle has in the abstract and in perfection, and 
to show what its utility is in the economy of vegetable life." The details 
are too technical and the investigation too mathematical to be reproduced 
here. It explains how this spiral arrangement] 
would effect the most thorough and rapid distribution of the 
leaves around the stem, each new or higher leaf falling over the 
angular space between the two older ones which are nearest in 
direction so as to subdivide it in the same ratio, k, in which the 
first two, or any two successive ones, divide the circumference. 
But according to such an arrangement there could be no limited 
systems or cycles, or no leaf would ever fall exactly over any 
other; and, as I have said, we have no evidence, and could have 
none, that this arrangement actually exists in nature. To realize 
simply and purely the property of the most thorough distribu- 
tion, the most complete exposure of the leaves to light and air 
around the stem, and the most ample elbow-room or space for 
expansion in the bud, is to realize a property that exists sepa- 
rately only in abstraction, like a line without breadth. Never- 
theless practically, and so far as observation can go, we find 
that the last two fractions, -| and -^3 , and all further ones of 
the first series, like Jf-, etc., which are all indistinguishable as 
measured values in the plant, do actually realize this property 
with all needful accuracy. Thus -|=o.625 ; A== °-6i5; and 
££=0.619; an d differ from k by 0.007, 0.001, 0.003, respect- 
ively; or they all differ by inappreciable values from the 
quantity which might therefore be made to stand for all of 
them. But in putting- k for all the values of the first series 
after the first three, it should be with the understanding that it 



308 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

is not so employed in its capacity as the grand type, or the 
source of the distributive character which they have; in its 
capacity as an irrational fraction, — but simply as being indis- 
tinguishable practically from these rational ones, and as being 
entirely consistent practically with the property that rational 
proper fractions also have of forming limited systems or cycles. 
Much mystification has come from the irrational character of 
this fraction ; scepticism on the part of non-mathematical 
botanists, and mysticism on the part of mathematicians. The 
simpler or the first three fractions of this series have also in a 
less degree the same distributive quality, and so in a still less 
degree have the fractions of the two lower series. But all the 
fractions left among possible ones, within the limits considered, 
that are sufficiently simple to be readily identified, are the 
fractions ^ and -|, or their complements -| and \\ and these 
exceptions, as I have said, are all the grounds of fact which at 
first sight give any plausibility to the theory of Phyllotaxy, or 
make its laws anything other apparently than the necessary 
consequences of purely numerical properties in the simpler 
fractions. Yet beside the fact that these two have not the dis- 
tributive character of the others, the fact should be taken 
account of, that by confining ourselves to the limits ^ to £ we 
have neglected several other simple fractions, that are even 
worse adapted for the purpose which the great majority appear 
to serve. These fractions are -jj-, -|, -J-, and -J, or their comple- 
ments. Moreover, we should consider that as the fractions 
peculiar to the two lower series are much less fitted for this 
purpose than those of the first series, so they are. much less 
frequently found in nature. 

Taking account of all these facts, we find the hypothesis that 
nature has chosen certain intervals in the spiral arrangements 
of leaves, and for the purpose I have indicated, to be sufficiently 
probable to justify a more careful consideration of it. Wide 
divergences from the most perfect realization of this purpose, 
such as we have among the more frequent forms in the fractions 
■J and f , or in the alternate and three-leaved systems, and also 
among the less frequent forms, indicate the existence of other 
conditions or purposes in these arrangements, which J propose 



ARRANGEMENT OF LEA FES. 309 

to consider further on. I may remark here, however, that these 
two classes of exceptions form the most perfect realization of 
the distributive property, namely, those of the first series which 
belong to the most advanced forms of life, and those peculiar 
to the two other series, are probably due to widely different 
causes ; the one having, in fact, a high degree of specialization, 
and the other falling short in respect to this distributive prop- 
erty on account of a low degree of specialization. This view, 
which is one of the consequences of theoretical considerations 
on the origin of these arrangements, that will be presented 
when we come to consider the origin of spiral arrangements in 
general, and of the whorl, is significantly in accordance with 
the observation that the forms peculiar to the two lower series 
are more frequent among fossil plants than among surviving 
ones. 

[After an examination "quite independently of theory, of the properties 
in the spiral arrangements of all the fractions between \ and f-, or rather 
between \ and f, and of a less denomination than I4ths," the author pro- 
ceeds.] 

All the fractions of the actual arrangements of nature, as well as 
the less simple theoretical ones of Phyllotaxy, have the property, 
that after the first turn of the cycle, and also in this first turn 
for all the fractions of the first series, or for those most com- 
monly occurring in nature, each leaf of the cycle is so placed 
over the space between older leaves nearest in direction to it as 
always to fall near the middle, and never beyond the middle third 
of the space, or by more than one sixth of the space from the 
middle, until the cycle is completed, when the new leaf is placed 
exactly over an older one. This property depends mathemat- 
ically on the character of the continued fractions, of which 
these fractions are the approximations, according to the theory 
of Phyllotaxy. 

The last denominators in these continued fractions represent 
the ratios of the contiguous intervals introduced in the second 
or third turns by the third or fourth leaves. Only the first 
two fractions in each of these series conform to the above 
law. The others, like -f and -|, violate the law early in the 



3io 



PHILOSOPHICAL DLSCUSSLONS. 



cycle; and this explains the absence of them from natural 
arrangements of the spiral type. The property common to 
the latter resembles what we have observed in the arrange- 
ments of whorls, namely, that the leaves of successive whorls 
are so placed that those of the upper one fall over the 
middle positions of the spaces between those of the lower 
one; but those of the next one above, or in the third whorl, 
are thus made to fall directly over the leaves of the first. Two 
whorls thus constitute a cycle, in the sense in which this name 
is applied to the spiral arrangements; and in respect to their 
distributive and cyclic characters, whorls are thus most closely 
related to the J, or alternate system. But there is, as I have 
said, no fundamental or genetic relationship between them and 
this particular form of the spiral arrangement. The relation- 
ship is rather an adaptive or analogical one. They are, so to 
speak, two distinct solutions of the same problem, two modes 
of realizing the same utilities, or securing the same advan- 
tages; like the wings of birds and bats. 

One of these utilities we have now sufficiently considered, 
namely, that which the theoretical angle k would realize most 
perfectly; by which the leaves would be distributed most 
thoroughly and rapidly around the stem, exposed most com- 
pletely to light and air, and provided with the greatest freedom 
for symmetrical expansion, together with a compact arrange- 
ment in the bud. Neither this property, nor an exact cyclical 
, arrangement, ought, as I have said, to be found, or expected, 
in the incipient parts at the centre of the bud, any more than 
the perfect proportions and adaptations of the mature animal 
could be expected, or are found, in the embryo. Both are 
fully determined, no doubt, in the vital forces of the individu- 
al's growth. Our question is, what has determined such an 
action in these vital forces ? " Their very nature, or an ulti- 
mate creative power," is the answer which the theory of types 
gives to this question. "The necessities of their lives, both 
outward and inward, or the conditions past and present of their 
existence," is the answer of the theory of adaptation. Science 
ought to be entirely neutral between these theories, and ready 
to receive any confirmation of either of them which can be 



A RRA NGEMENT OF LEA VES. 3 1 1 

adduced; though, from this point of view, the theory of adap- 
tation has a decided advantage; since the theory of types can 
have no confirmation from observation except of a negative 
sort, the failure of its rival to show conclusive proofs. But we 
have seen that whatever can be said in favor of the view, that 
there is a unity of type in the intervals of spiral arrangements, 
is directly convertible to the advantage of the theory of adap- 
tation; since this unity consists in the distributive property 
common to those arrangements .* Natural Selection, however, 
or the indirect agency of utility in producing adaptations, can- 
not, so far as we have yet seen, be appealed to for the expla- 
nation of the spiral arrangements in general; nor for the 
explanation of the verticil arrangements; though the character 
in the latter, in which they resemble the alternate system, may 
come within the range of this explanation through the utility 
I have pointed out. The only ground for the action of 
Natural Selection which I have yet shown is in the choice 
there is among possible spiral arrangements with reference to 
this utility; and it appears that the principle is fully competent 
to account for the relative frequency of these, and the entire 
absence of some of them from the actual forms of nature. 

We now come to the special study of two other features 
which have appeared in these arrangements, namely, the spiral 
character itself and the simplicity of their cycles. The cyclic 
character is entirely wanting in the ideal arrangement of the 

* There is a remarkable analogy between this relation and that of the two theories of 
the structure of the honey-cell. The work of the bees suggests to the geometrician a 
perfectly definite and regular form, which he finds to be the most economical form of 
compartments into which space can be divided ; or he finds that the honeycomb would 
be the lightest, or be composed of the least material for the same capacity and number 
of compartments, if partitioned into such figures as the typical cell. From the defini- 
tion of this figure he is able to compute its angles and proportions with a degree of pre- 
cision to which the bees' work only roughly approximates at its best, and from which it 
often deviates widely. The theory of types regards this ideal figure as a determining 
cause of the structure, or as the pattern which guides the bees' instinct towards an ideally 
perfect economy. But a plainer order of economy, a simple housewifely one, saving at 
every turn, together with the conveniences and utilities which govern the work of social 
nest-building insects in general, would result, if carried out to perfection, in the very 
same form. Hence the theory of adaptation regards the honey-cells as modifications of 
similar but rougher structures of the same sort, determined by the further utility of 
simple saving in working with a costly material; and whatever evidence there is that the 
bees' instinct is determined toward the ideally perfect type of the honey-cell is directly 
convertible into proofs that it is so determined by these simple conveniences and utilities 



3 i2. PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

interval k; but, as I have said, this interval cannot be proved 
to exist in nature; for even if it did, it would be indistinguish- 
able even from the simple fraction -J-. This very fact, however, 
makes the interval -|, a sufficiently exact realization of the dis- 
tributive property, according to the degree of exactness with 
which actual plants are constructed. But f is also a compar- 
atively simple cycle, though there would not be sufficient 
evidence that its cyclic character is an essential one, or other 
than incidental to the scale of exactness in the structure of 
plants, if there did not exist several distinguishable and simpler 
cycles, namely, £, f , and -|. The cyclic character of leaf 
arrangements is, indeed, a more noticeable feature in plants 
generally than the distributive one. It is obviously essential, 
and involves on the theory of adaptation some important 
utility. Whatever this may be, it is clear that it has to be 
gained by means directly opposed to those which secure dis- 
tribution; that is, its utility depends on leaves coming together 
in direction, or being brought nearer to each other than they 
would otherwise be; instead of their being dispersed as widely 
and as thoroughly as possible. This utility is obviously to be 
sought in the internal relations of leaves to each other, or 
their connections through the stem, and not in their outward 
relations, which require exposure, expansion, and elbow-room. 
The apparently inconsistent means of these two ends are both 
realized, however, without interference, in the actual cycles 
of natural arrangements. Through the simplicity of these 
cycles leaves, not very remote on the stem, are brought nearer 
to each other, and into more direct internal connection than 
they would have but for this simplicity; while, in the more 
prevalent natural forms of the cycle, leaves that are nearest to 
each other on the stem are separated as widely as is possible 
under this condition. That this prevalence is due to selection, 
through the utility already considered, has been shown to be 
sufficiently probable. I propose now to connect the preva- 
lence of simplicity in these cycles with another utility. 

Leaves that are successive, or nearest each other on the stem, 
may be regarded as rivals, and as rendering each other no 
service. Those that are more remote may come into relations 



ARRANGEMENT OF LEA VES. 3 13 

of dependence, one on the other. Between the leaf and the 
stem the relations of nutrition are reciprocal. At first, and for 
the development of the leaf, the stem furnishes nutriment to it. 
Afterwards the leaf furnishes nutriment for the further lateral 
expansion of the stem. The development of the stem itself, 
first in length, while the leaves are expanding, and afterwards 
in breadth and firmness through the nutrition afforded by the 
developed leaves, has the effect, and, we may presume, the use 
or function, of a still more important distribution of the leaves 
than that we have considered. We have hitherto attended 
only to the distribution effected by the character of the diver- 
gences of leaves around the stem. Their distribution along 
the stem, or their separation by the intern odes of the stem, is 
a stilL more direct and effective mode of accomplishing at least 
one of the uses of the property of distribution, namely, ex- 
posure to light and air. The special accomplishment of this 
important end in the higher plants is secured by two different 
means; by. the firm fibrous structure and the breadth of stems, 
branches, and trunks in grasses, shrubs, and trees, and by the 
climbing powers and prehensile apparatus of climbing plants; 
and in the latter we find the highest degree of specialization 
or development in the vegetable world. The distribution 
effected by the separation of leaves along the stem in great 
measure supersedes the value of their distribution around if, 
so far as the ultimate functions of leaves are concerned, and 
independently of their relations in development or in the bud; 
and this gives freer play to the means of securing whatever 
advantage there may be in the simpler cyclic arrangements, 
like the £ and f systems. Accordingly we find, in general, the 
simpler cycles on the stems of those plants that have the 
longest internodes; and, on the other hand, the more compli- 
cated cycles are found only in cases of very short internodes 
or in great condensations of leaves. There is no evidence, 
however, that in the condensed form in which undeveloped 
leaves exist in the bud the cycles are any more complicated 
than on the stem. Nor ought we to expect such evidence ; 
for it is a false analogy that would lead us to seek for types in 
the early and rude forms of embryonic life; though, if the 



3H 



PHIL OSOPHICA L DISCUSSIONS. 



simpler cycles were really derived from the more complicated 
ones, rather than from the utility common to all, we ought, by 
the analogy of embryology, to find some traces of the process 
in the bud. No doubt the types exhibited by the mature forms 
of life exist in the embryo or bud, though not in a visibly 
embodied form; but rather in a predetermined mode of action 
in vital forces, embodied in gemmules rather than the visible 
germ. But while the distribution effected by the internodes 
of the stem thus allows the simpler cycles to occur, it does 
not account for their occurrence. This, moreover, must 
depend on relations in mature, or else in growing leaves, to 
those below them; and not on their earlier relations in the 
bud; since, as we have seen, the more complicated cycles are 
the best fitted for these relations, and in mature stems are only 
found in great condensations of leaves ; such as the bud also 
presents; yet without any greater complication than the stem 
has. The simplicity of the cycles in stems with long inter- 
nodes has the effect that the absolute distance between two 
leaves standing one over the other is not so great as it other- 
wise would be. There is, no doubt, a disadvantage in long 
internodes, or in the separation of growing parts by long inter- 
vals from their source of nutrition; a disadvantage, which only a 
better exposure to light and air for their subsequent functions 
could compensate. On the theory of adaptation there would 
seem to be, then, some advantage to the younger leaf in 
standing directly over an older one, and not far above it; a 
greater advantage than in any other position at the same 
height; and this advantage could apparently be no other than 
an internal nutritive one, having reference to the sources or 
movements of sap and the nutrition conveyed by it. But sap 
circulates with nearly equal facility around and along the 
stem; and if the lower leaf were really a special source of 
nutrition to the growing one above it, it could furnish nutrition 
almost as readily to any other position on the stem at the 
same height as to the point directly above it, or on the same 
side. The new leaf is not sensibly nearer the market on ac- 
count of this feature in the arrangement. But may there not 
be some advantage to the older leaf in standing directly under 



ARRANGEMENT OF LEA VES. 



315 



the younger? Next to the advantage of being near a market, 
or a source of supplies, is the advantage of being in the line 
of traffic' This, indeed, is in part what it is to be a market, 
rather than a mine. A leaf is not only a productive or indus- 
trial centre, but a commercial one. It effects exchanges, both 
giving and receiving supplies. When mature, or fully estab- 
lished in this capacity, it draws from the roots its raw material 
of water and mineral salts, and from the air its more costly 
material, and in exchange sends forth into the great commerce 
of the stem its wonderfully intricate fabrics of atoms, woven 
on the sunbeam, its soluble colloids. Now, although sap may 
flow with nearly equal facility in all directions in the stem, it 
probably does flow with greatest rapidity in the direct lines of 
the forces that impel it, the lines of osmotic force. Sap flows 
in the spring most freely from that side of a perforated tree 
which is immediately below the largest branch. This shows 
that even in the least active condition of the circulation, when 
the trunk is surcharged with sap, the forces of circulation are 
not simply diffusive or hydrostatic] and they must be much 
less so when definite outlets of this supply become established 
in the growing buds and leaves of the spring-time. The char- 
acter of the circulation is principally determined by the 
hydraulic action of osmotic forces. Water may flow with 
equal facility in any part of a river-bed, and across as well as 
along: but it actually does flow fastest along the middle. The 
growing leaf has different needs from those of the mature one ; 
hence they are not rivals, or competitors in the market, but 
buyer and seller, or borrower and lender. The mature leaf 
needs from the stem water and mineral salts ; the growing leaf 
needs the organic materials of new tissues. The mature leaf 
helps to prepare the latter by concentrating it, withdrawing the 
water, and adding its own contribution of organic material in 
return. But while aiding its younger fellow in this way, it is 
aided in return, or its efficiency is increased, by the increased 
circulation produced through the forces of movement above it. 
In place of a glut in the market we have an active exchange. 
There is, undoubtedly, a tendency in these physiological 
causes, however feeble, to that vertical allignment of not very 



3 i6 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

distant leaves, which the cyclic character of the spiral arrange- 
ments exhibits, and most markedly in the \ or alternate system. 
We have thus assigned more or less probable utilities to two 
prominent features in the particular forms of the spiral and 
verticil arrangements of leaves; their distributive and cyclic 
characters. We now come to a much more obscure problem, 
which connects the verticil and spiral arrangements in general 
with their probable utilities, and through these with their origin 
in lower forms of vegetable life. But before entering upon the 
study of this as an actual physical problem, it is necessary to 
consider what are the real meanings of the terms "spiral" and 
"whorl." Are they only conventional modes of representing 
the phenomena of arrangement, or are they strictly descriptive 
of the facts in their physical connections ? About the whorl 
there can be no doubt. The actual physical connections and 
separations of leaves in this type of arrangement are directly 
indicated by the term; but the ideal geometrical line connect- 
ing successive leaves in the so-called spiral' arrangements may 
be a purely formal element in the description of them, and of 
no material account, — a mode of reducing them to order in 
our conceptions of them, but implying no physical relation- 
ships. There are several ways in which we can so represent 
the features of these arrangements. Connecting by an ideal 
line (which may have no physical significance) the leaves 
nearest to each other on the developed stem, and by the shorter 
way round, is one way,— the more common way of represent^ 
ing their arrangements. The direction in which this should be 
drawn, whether to the right or the left, is quite arbitrary in the 
£ or alternate system. Connecting, for other cases, the leaves 
in the same succession, but by the longer way round is another 
way. These are distinctly different spiral paths, but not the 
only ones by which the parts of these arrangements might be 
represented geometrically. By connecting them alternately, as 
i with 3, and this With 5, etc., and 2 with 4, and this with 6, etc., 
we should connect the leaves of the various arrangements by 
two spiral paths, and these either by the longer or the shorter 
way round. Or again, by connecting the series 1, 4, 7, etc., and 
2, 5, 8, etc., and 3, 6, 9, etc., we should include all the leaves in 



. ARRANGEMENT OF LEA VES. 3 x 7 

three spiral paths; and so on. In some cases these lines would 
not be spiral, but the vertical .alignments we have considered. 
For example, in the last case they would be vertical for the 
cycle |-; since in this the leaves 1 and 4, or 2 and 5, are the 
beginnings of distinct successive cycles. If the leaves 1, 2, 3, 
were in this case of the same age, or at the same height on the 
stem, and were succeeded at an interval on the stem by 4, 5, 
6, also coeval, and so on, we should have the main feature 
of the verticil arrangement, but not the kind of alternation 
that belongs to natural whorls. Between 1, 2, and 3 in the 
natural whorl equal intervals exist, namely, -*-; and also be- 
tween 4, 5, and 6, and so on; but between 3 and 4 the inter- 
val hi natural three-leaved whorls is either £, J-, or -|, according 
as we choose our spiral paths, or determine which member of 
the upper whorl shall be counted as the fourth leaf. 

We perceive, therefore, that there is no continuity or principle 
of connection between spiral arrangements and the whorls; and, 
moreover, that these spiral paths are purely ideal or geometrical 
lines, so far as we have yet seen. Is there any good reason for 
supposing that the simplest of these, which connects successive 
leaves on the stem the shorter way round, is any less formal or 
conventional than the others; or indicates a real connection of 
the leaves on this path, or any closer original real connection 
among them? There are two significant facts bearing on this 
question to which I have already adverted. The first is that 
the natural fractions of the lower group of our table, or those 
peculiar to the last two series of the theory of Phyllotaxy, 
represent the less frequent forms of spiral arrangements, and 
that if the successive members of these arrangements are con- 
nected in the usual mode by this simplest path, or the shorter 
way round, these members are seen to have less angles of 
divergence than those of the more common arrangements; or 
are much nearer each other on this line than the others are. 
We should thus have the fractions f , ^-, J, f, 1 all of which 
indicate comparatively small divergences, smaller than any 
among the common ones. The second fact is the observation 
that these arrangements are relatively more common among 
fossil plants than among surviving ones. These facts agree 



3i» 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



well with the supposition that this simplest spiral path is unlike 
the others, and is not a merely formal assumption for the rep- 
resentation of leaf-arrangements, but the trace of a former 
physical connection of the members, or even of a continuity 
of leafy expansion along this path; a leaf-like expansion 
resembling a spiral stairway. The leaves, according to this 
supposition, are the relics of segments made in such a spiral 
leaf-like expansion around the stem; remnants of it grown 
smaller and smaller, or more widely separated as they became 
more advantageously situated through the developments of the 
stem in length and firmness ; and expanding, perhaps, in an 
opposite direction along the leaf-stems ; or, losing their leaf- 
character and expansion altogether, as they became adapted 
to other uses in the economy of the higher vegetable life, 
namely, the use of the leaf-stem itself, as in the tendril, and 
the uses of leaf-like extensions, as in the reproductive organs 
of the flower. 

But are there any surviving instances of such continuous 
spiral leaf-like expansions on vegetable stems; or, in default 
of these, could there be any utility in such an arrangement 
itself to justify the supposition of it as the basis of the de- 
velopment of more special forms? Before considering this 
question, however, I will consider what other resources of 
explanation hypothesis can command. The spiral arrange- 
ment might be supposed to be the result of a physiological 
necessity among the laws of growth, through which single 
leaves would be produced at regular intervals or steps of de- 
velopment, and placed so as to compass the utilities we have 
already considered, namely, those of horizontal and longitudi- 
nal distribution in successive leaves, and vertical allignmenj; in 
remoter ones. This would account for the spiral arrangements, 
and it may be a superior mode of growth, or involve some 
physiological utility; but that it is not a necessity, is proved by 
the arrangements of the whorl, in which all the members of a 
group of leaves are simultaneously produced. The existence 
of the whorl, then, sets this hypothesis aside. Again, we 
might suppose on the theory of types that these two great 
types of arrangement are two fundamental facts in the higher 



ARRANGEMENT OF LEA VES. 319 

vegetable life, parts of a supernatural plan ; two aboriginal and 
absolute features in this plan. But this, as we have seen, is 
not to solve the problem, but to surrender it ; or rather to de- 
mand its surrender, and forbid its solution. Again, the pro- 
duction of adventitious buds in plants, or in separated parts of 
plants, as in cuttings, dependent only, apparently, on a favora- 
ble situation for nutrition, is of common occurrence even in 
the higher plants. If we could suppose that the definite hori- 
zontal distributions of successive leaves were wholly sup- 
erseded in their utility by the distributions along the stem, or 
that the leaves could thus be sufficiently exposed to light and 
air; the power of the adventitious production of buds or leaves 
in favorable situations might have caused an arrangement 
without this feature of spiral regularity. But they would still 
be brought into vertical allignments, if the physiological ad- 
vantage of the simpler cycles, which has been pointed out, be 
a real and effective one; for even the so-called adventitious 
production of buds may reasonably be supposed to be gov- 
erned by supplies of nutriment. Moreover, these vertical lines 
would be placed at equal intervals around the stem, on account 
of the advantage there would be in such a distribution, both 
for internal and external nutrition. But though leaves would 
thus be placed at convenient distances along equidistant verti- 
cal lines, there would be no consideration of utility to govern 
their relations to each other on different lines, so as to throw 
them into whorls, or into definite spiral arrangements. It 
might, however, be advantageous for leaves on a line between 
two others to be placed in intermediate positions with respect 
to the leaves of these two, and if the latter were placed at the 
same heights we should have a sector of three whorls; that is, 
-two leaves of the highest and two of the lowest whorl, and 
one leaf of the intermediate whorl. But such an arrangement 
disregards or sacrifices in the structure of the whorl itself the 
advantage, if it be one, of such an alternation. It cannot be 
reasonable to suppose that a leaf on an intermediate line would 
seek distance and isolation- from those of the lines beside it, 
and, at the same time, seek close connection horizontally with 
those of its own whorl. This would be directly opposed to 



3 20 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSION'S. 

the accommodation of uses in spiral arrangements. The 
structure of whorls, and the alternation in successive ones, 
appear, therefore, to be of distinct origins. Whatever advan- 
tage there is in the former appears to be sacrificed by this 
alternation, and by the spiral arrangements; or, if it be a dis- 
advantage, it is avoided by these. It is probably on the whole 
a disadvantage; since it is ill-fitted for great extensions and 
branchings in stems, for which the simpler spiral arrangements 
appear peculiarly fitted. This contrast, however, cannot be 
regarded as the origin of the contrasted types themselves, and 
the soundest conclusion appears to be, that, whatever adapta- 
tions they may have, these are only incidental, and are not 
concerned in their origination, either directly through physio- 
logical laws of growth, or indirectly by Natural Selection. 
They are properly genetic characters. This is confirmed by 
the fact that the particular arrangement for each plant is pro- 
vided for, or already completed in the bud; that is,, it is not a 
result of laws of development in general, but of the spe^'al 
nature of the plant, or the predisposition of its vital forces. 
In regard to the causes which I have supposed to control the 
so-called adventitious production of buds or leaves, it should 
not be supposed that these exert in actual plants any consider- 
able influence; though the plant's particular laws of growth 
are probably not in opposition to them. They should only be 
considered as modifying agencies reacting on the formative 
forces ; but they fail, as we have seen, to account for the spiral 
and verticil arrangements, and their contrasts through any 
utility which could modify these forces. But in concl idirg 
therefore that these general types of arrangement ought to be 
regarded as only genetic characters in the higher plants, and 
as presenting no important advantage or disadvantage, inde- 
pendently of the special forms which they have acquired, or 
in present forms of life; we are not precluded by such a con- 
clusion from the further inquiry as to what former advantage 
:there could have- been in less specialized forms, before these 
genetic characters had lost their special significance (if any 
ever existed), and when they could have stood in more im- 
mediate and important relations to the conditions of the plant's 



ARRANGEMENT OF LEA VES. 321 

existence. In this inquiry our principal guide must be hy- 
pothesis, but it will be hypothesis under the check and control 
of the theory of adaptation. It will not be legitimate to 
assume any unknown form as a past form of life, and as a 
basis for these arrangements, without showing that such an 
hypothetical form would have been a useful modification of a 
still simpler one, which still exists and is known. In this way 
we may be able to bridge over the chasm that separates the 
higher and lower forms of vegetable life. 

Our problem then becomes, Whether, in the absence of any 
surviving instances of continuous spiral leaf-like expansions on 
vegetable stems, we can find any utility in such an arrange- 
ment that could act to modify simpler known forms, and con- 
vert them into this ? If we suppose our hypothetical spiral 
leaf- blade to be untwisted, it becomes a single-blade frond, or 
a frond with one of its blades undeveloped. In considering 
what advantage there could be in the twist, we should revert 
to the general objects or functions of leaf-like expansions. 
They are obviously to expose a large surface to the action of 
light on its tissues, and to bring it into the most complete con- 
tact with the medium in which the plant lives,— with water, 
or, in more advanced plants, with the air. Secondly, to 
accomplish this with the least expenditure of material: not by 
an absolute, but a relative economy, which has reference to 
the needs of other parts, like the stem or roots. In many of 
the higher plants the developments of the stem serve to dimin- 
ish to the utmost the amount of this material, and the needed 
expansion, by giving to them advantageous positions. The 
first of these objects is secured in the simplest and rudest man- 
ner in the a/gce, as represented by the sea-weeds. This is a 
simple expansion of cellular tissue. But even here we do not 
find perfectly plane surfaces, facing only two ways, and allow- 
ing the water to glide smoothly and unobstructed over them. 
The corrugated surfaces of many of them, and in the large 
leaves of some land-plants, are doubtless due to unequal 
growths in the cellular tissues; but such a physiological explan- 
ation of this feature does not preclude the supposition of its 
being a fixed character in a plant, or becoming such in conse- 



322 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

quence of its utility. It certainly serves the purpose of 
opposing the leaf-surface to many directions, both with refer- 
ence to the incidence of light, and to the movement of the 
surrounding medium, — to water-currents, or to breezes. Seg- 
mentation, again, such as is seen in the fronds of brakes or 
ferns, is another way of bringing the moving medium to 
impinge on the leaf-surface; but the feasibility of this depends 
on the fibrous frame- work which the leaves of land-plants have 
acquired for the support of their softer tissues. Such a seg- 
mentation also appears among the higher plants in compound 
leaves and in whorls; and, indeed, the whole foliage of trees 
and shrubs may, from this point of view, be regarded as the 
reduced segments of the blades of branching fronds, turned in 
all directions in search of light, and inviting the movements of 
air through their expanded interstices. Such is the kind of 
utility that may be claimed for the structure of our hypothet- 
ical spiral frond. Another utility in this structure is obvious 
when we consider the transition of plant-life from aquatic con- 
ditions to those of the dry land and the air; as vegetation 
slowly crept from its watery cradle, or was left stranded by the 
retiring sea. In default of strength in its material, such as a 
slowly acquired .fibrous structure or frame-work ultimately gave 
to it in this transition, the strongest form would be the most 
advantageous in sustaining the weight of the no longer buoyant 
plant. A spiral arrangement of the blade around a compara- 
tively firm, and, perhaps, already somewhat fibrous stem, would 
come nearer fulfilling this condition than any other conceivable 
modification of the frond. 

We have, so far, in conformity to the spiral arrangement in 
leaves, supposed this twisted frond to be a single-bladed one, 
or with only one blade developed. This would be a first step 
in that reduction of leaf-expansion which a more advantageous 
situation of it would allow; and might be required, even at 
this early stage of atmospheric plant-life, on account of the 
greatly increased importance of the roots and stem. But this 
hypothesis is not necessary in general for the ends we have 
considered. A two-bladed frond might be similarly twisted 
and give rise to a double spiral surface like a double spiral 



ARRANGEMENT OF LEA VES. 



323 



stair-way, or like the blade of an auger ; or such a surface as 
the two handles of the auger describe as they are revolved, 
and, at the same time, carried forward in the direction of the 
boring. The simplest segmentation of such a twisted frond, 
after the stem had acquired sufficient strength, and such a sub- 
sequent reduction of the segments as might be required for the 
nutrition of the stem, would give rise to parts, which, turned 
upwards to face the sky, and also separated, perhaps, by the 
growth of internodes in the lengthening stem, would result in 
what we may regard as the original form of whorls, namely, a 
continuous leaf-like expansion around the stem. The origin 
of the whorl arrangement itself would thus be distinct, as we 
have found that it ought to be, from the origin of the relations 
in the parts of whorls to one another, and to those of adjacent 
whorls. These would be results of a subsequent segmentation, 
and would be determined by the utilities which we have con- 
sidered in this and in the spiral arrangements. And so both 
this and the spiral arrangements as general types of structure, 
though originating, as I have supposed, in useful relations to 
former conditions of existence, may be regarded in relation to 
later developments as useless, and merely inherited or genetic 
types; the bases on which subsequent utilities had to erect 
existing adaptations of structure. The segmentation of the 
single spiral frond would at first have little or no relation to 
these more refined utilities of arrangement, but out of all the 
variable and possible arrangements so produced there would 
be a gradual selection, and a tendency toward the prevalence 
of those special forms, which are at present the most common 
ones. The typical or unique angle of the theory of Phyl- 
lotaxy would thus appear to be the goal toward which they 
tend, rather than the origin of the spiral arrangements. But 
since a simple cyclic arrangement appears to have also an im- 
portant value, we cannot concede to the typical angle the 
exclusive dignity of even this position. 

The segmentation I have supposed in this process should 
not be regarded as an hypothetical element in it, since it is a 
well-established law of development. Distinct organs are not 
separately produced from the beginnings of their growth, but 



324 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

make part of their progress in conjunction, or while incorpo- 
rated in forms, from which they become afterwards separated ; 
and become then more and more special in their characters, 
or different from other parts. It is this differentiation and 
separation of parts out of already grown wholes which dis- 
tinguishes development from mere growth. The analogy of 
the- phases of development in embryonic or germinal life- to 
development in general is liable, however, to be carried too 
far; and the fact is liable to be overlooked, that these phases of 
growth are special acquisitions of the higher forms of life, 
which have features of adaptation peculiar to them. But the 
more general features of them, and the useless, or merely 
genetic phases, may safely be regarded as traces of past char- 
acters of adaptation, which a change in the mode and order 
of development has not obliterated; while new adaptations 
have been added, that have no relation to any past or simpler 
forms of life, but only to the advantages which embryonic or 
germinal modes of reproduction have secured. 

If we should follow out the phases of general development in 
the progress of the leaf along the line of its highest ascent in 
development, from the segmentations we have supposed in the 
twisted frond, we should soon arrive at the steps already familiar 
in the principles of vegetable morphology. In these we have 
the same law of segmentation or separation of parts, and the 
same successive relations of genetic and adaptive characters. 
What was produced for one purpose becomes serviceable to a 
new one ; and in its capacity as a merely genetic character, or 
as an inherited feature, becomes the basis for the acquisition of 
new adaptations. Thus the fibrous structure, at first useful in 
sustaining the softer tissues of the leaf, becomes the means of 
a longitudinal development of it, and its more complete expos- 
ure to light and air by the growth of the foot-stalk. This stalk 
acquires next a new utility in climbing-plants to which it 
becomes exclusively adapted in the tendril. The adaptive 
characters of the tendril are its later acquisitions. Its genetic 
characters, such as its position on the stem, and its relations to 
the leaves, become useless or merely inherited characters. 
The contrast of genetic and adaptive characters appears thus 



ARRANGEMENT OF LEA VES. 



3*5 



to have no absolute value in the structure and lives of organ- 
isms, but only a relative one. The first are related principally 
to past and generally unknown adaptations; the second to 
present and more obvious ones. 

In accordance with this law I have supposed that the gen- 
eral features of the two types of leaf-arrangement, for which 
no present utilities appear in the lives of the higher plants, 
were nevertheless useful features in former conditions of vege- 
table life. The more special features of these arrangements 
should not, from this point of view, be regarded as derived one 
from another, much less from the typical or unique form of the 
theory of Phyllotaxy. In one sense they may, indeed, be said 
to be derived from this form, at least some of them; yet not 
from it as an actually past form or progenitor, but rather from 
the utility which it represents in the abstract. I have, how- 
ever, pointed out that another utility, shown in the simpler 
cyclic arrangements, has an equal claim to this spiritual pater- 
nity. The actual forms of the spiral arrangements in leaves 
should, therefore, be regarded as forms independently se- 
lected, and as selected on the two principles of utility, which 
we have considered, out of a very large variety of original 
forms. We have seen that even those forms which survive 
include almost all possible ones that could be distinguished; 
though the more prevalent ones are at present in the minority. 
We have also seen that the later fact, and the more frequent 
occurrence of inferior forms among fossil plants, are almost the 
only grounds on which the inductive foundation of the theory 
of Phyllotaxy could be regarded as well established. On these 
grounds, and on this foundation, I have sought by hypothesis 
to reconstruct the continuity of higher and lower forms in 
vegetable life; and through this to find the origin of the prin- 
cipal types of arrangement in leaves. The speculation lies 
wholly within the limits prescribed for legitimate hypothesis in 
science. It does not assume utilities in themselves unknown, 
but assumes only unobserved or unknown applications of them, 
and raises to the rank of essential properties relations of use, 
which, at first sight, appear to be only accidental ones. At- 
tention may be claimed at the least for it as an illustration of 



326 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

the method by which the principle of Natural Selection is to 
be applied as a working hypothesis in the investigations of 
general physiology or physical biology. 

Many features in the structure of leaves, not relating to 
their arrangements, fall beyond the proper province of this 
inquiry, but equally illustrate the relative nature of the dis- 
tinction between genetic and adaptive characters. The gen- 
eral character common to all leaves and leaf-like organs has an 
obvious utility with reference to the function of nutrition. 
Some special modifications have the purposes of defense, as in 
the thorn; of mechanical support, as in the tendril; and of 
reproduction, as in the parts of the flower. But the vast 
variety of forms which leaves and the parts of flowers present 
do not suggest any obvious uses. On the theory of adaptation 
they would naturally be referred to a combination of adaptive 
and inherited features. A fixed proportion between the two 
principal tissues in a plant due to some past utility may, with- 
out being changed, become adapted to new external relations, 
Or to new physiological conditions, through various arrange- 
ments of them in the structure of the leaf; and this would 
give rise to a great variety of forms. The forms of notched 
and sinuated leaves are referable to that process of segmenta- 
tion and reduction in leaf-expansions, which we have seen to 
be so important a process in the derivation of the higher 
plants. But another principle of utility comes into play in the 
lives of the higher plants, similar to that which appears to be 
the origin of some of the more conspicuous external characters 
of animals, namely, what produces distinguishableness and 
individuation in an animal race. No doubt the laws of inher- 
itance and Natural Selection account for much of the charac- 
ter of individuality in races, or for the fact that variation has a 
very limited range compared to the differences between species, 
so far as it affects any useful quality or character. But varia- 
tion, not only in animals, but also in many of the higher plants, 
is much more limited than these causes seem capable of ac- 
counting for. It is, apparently, as limited in respect to useless 
though conspicuous features as in those that are of recognized 
value to life. Sexual Selection, through which the characters 



ARRANGEMENT OF LEA VES. 



327 



of animals are chosen by themselves, or brought into relation 
to their perceptive and other psychical powers, is the cause 
assigned for this fact in the case of animals; that is, forms are 
chosen for their appearance, or for the pleasure they give to 
the senses. But plants have no senses, except a sense of 
touch; and they have no other known psychical powers. 
Nevertheless they present many conspicuous features of beauty 
to the eye, and many give forth agreeable and characteristic 
odors-. And such characters are apparently as fixed in many 
of the higher plants as in animals. The theory of types and 
the doctrine of Final Causes regard this fixedness and individ- 
uality as ends in themselves, or else as existing for the service 
of some higher form of life, or ultimately even for the uses of 
human life. But the theory of the adaptation of every feature 
in a form of life to its own uses is not without resources for 
the explanation of these characters in plants; for though the 
plant has no sense to appreciate, or power to select, its own 
features of individuality and beauty, yet the lives of many of 
the higher plants are essentially dependent on such power in 
insects; so that whatever character renders them attractive to 
insects, or distinguishable by their sight, may be said to be of 
use to plants for the ends of reproduction, and tends in this 
way to become a fixed or only slightly variable character. 
That this cause may have acted not only to determine definite 
shapes, colors, and odors in flowers, but also definite features 
in the foliage of plants, as the marks or signs of these, and 
that the value of such signs may have determined a greater 
degree of fixedness or constancy in the arrangements, as well 
as in the shapes of leaves, is an hypothesis that may be added 
to those we have already considered, concerning the utilities 
of these arrangements. This cause would tend to give promi- 
nence to those features in arrangement which are most con- 
spicuous to the eye, namely, those of cyclic regularity and 
simplicity. Such an explanation of this cyclic character, or 
the simple and definite arrangements of leaves at short inter- 
vals in vertical lines on the stem, or the utility of this as a dis- 
tinguishing character of the plant, is not inconsistent with the 
physiological utility in these arrangements, which I have 



328 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

pointed out ; but the two, in co-operating to the production of 
the same forms, would illustrate a principle in the economy of 
life which has a wide application, — the principle of indirect 
utility or correlative acquisition, dependent on ultimate laws in 
physical and mental natures, — through which independent 
utilities are realized by the same means, or the same means are 
made serviceable to more than one distinct end. In such ulti- 
mate, underived relations of adaptation in nature, we find 
principles of connection and a unity of plan which cannot be 
referred to any accidents of history or development. 



McCOSH ON INTUITIONS.* 

The philosophical and religious writings of Dr. McCosh 
have already secured for him a prominent position among 
living thinkers, and considerable influence both in Great Brit- 
ain and America. The present work f exhibits so much ability, 
good sense, and philosophical acumen that it will doubt- 
less increase his reputation and prove him a worthy successor 
of the distinguished metaphysicians who have rendered his 
native land famous in the contests of philosophy. Though in 
many respects original, professing to follow no school, and in 
reality independent in its spirit of all authority but that of the 
religious truths in behalf of which it is written, this work is 
nevertheless substantially a development from the Scottish 
school. The author regards in the same light with this school 
the range and province of metaphysical inquiry, and treats the 
doctrines of all other schools in the same spirit. He finds in 
the writings of Reid and Stewart, it is true, statements which 
would logically '-land us in very serious consequences," but 
with the essence of their doctrines, and especially with the 
natural realism of Sir William Hamilton, he strongly sympa- 
thizes, though he goes somewhat beyond Hamilton in his 
theory of immediate consciousness. 

His principal problem appears to have been to discover a 
theory of consciousness which shall assure us of as much as 
possible without carrying our assent on to the extremes to 
which the statements of philosophers too often logically tend. 
He seeks, that is, for a theory which shall assure us of the 

* From The Nation, Nov. i6, 1865. 

t '• The Intuitions of the Mind Inductively Investigated. By the Rev. James Mc- 
Cosh, LL.D., Professor of Logic and Metaphysics in Queen's College, Belfast." New. 
and revised edition. 8vo pp. 444. 



33°- PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

reality and permanence of the external world without leading 
us into materialism, or into a belief of the absolute permanence 
of matter; which shall assure us of the reality of cause and 
effect and the existence of power in the world without bringing 
us to the "dismal consequences" to which Kant's analysis 
of causation appears to lead; a theory which shall guarantee 
us a knowledge of substance or substantive reality, without 
upsetting our personality and landing us in pantheism; and 
which, at the same time, shall be free from the psychological 
objections that, since the time of Locke, have been urged 
against certain forms of the doctrine of intuitive universal 
truths. 

A fundamental principle of Dr. McCosh's system is that the 
mind always begins with the concrete, the singular, and the 
individual in its acquisition of knowledge, and arrives at uni- 
versal truths — not, indeed, as the results of a process, but in 
the course of a process, in which the elements of universal 
judgments must be produced by particular experiences and 
special judgments. These particulars are, however, of such a 
nature that they warrant the universal judgment, not by the 
cumulative force of experience, but by the inherent force of 
each particular conviction, which comes from a power in the 
mind, and only awaits the formation of the proper formula by 
generalization in order to pronounce a decision of a universal 
character. 

The author thus avoids the objections which have been so 
often urged against the doctrine of innate ideas. Universal 
judgments exist, he thinks, in the mind originally only as laws 
of our mental faculties, determining them to "look for" cer- 
tain facts which are really universal, but are only discovered in 
individual cases; and the individual decisions carry in them the 
truth of the universal. 

Having thus defined intuitive knowledge, our author pro- 
ceeds to show how such knowledge can be distinguished from 
other kinds, and he lays down the tests which the philosophy 
of common sense has prescribed in the writings of the Scottish 
school, the tests, namely, of self-evidence, necessity, and cath- 
olicity or universality in human beliefs. He divides the cog- 



McCOSH ON INTUITIONS. 



33* 



nitive acts of the mind into three species, and adopts as the 
generic name for them the theological term "convictions." 
There are the cognitive convictions, which decide immediately 
that an object exists, not only in relation to our faculties, but 
independently of them. By our cognitions we know, through 
sense-perception and self-consciousness, that something in 
particular exists, has existed, and will continue to exist. In 
other words, that something has present existence and present 
permanence. Such cognitions also decide immediately that 
the thing exists in space or is extended; also that it has power, 
or is a cause and will produce an effect. All this the intuitive 
powers of cognition anticipate by their innate nature, and they 
'.'look for" and discover all this in special experiences. 

Such intuitions precede, both logically and chronologically, 
all other "convictions." In this the author dissents from 
Hamilton's doctrine, which supposes a faculty of faith to un- 
derlie all our cognitive acts. " Intuitive beliefs " form with 
him a derived class of "convictions" — not derived from our 
cognitions logically, but from them as furnishing the materials 
on which a new class of intuitive powers are brought to bear. 
Our faith-intuitions have no real objects presented to them. 
" I hold," says the author, " that knowledge, psychologically 
considered, appears first, and then faith. But around our 
original cognitions there grows and clusters a body of primi- 
tive beliefs, which goes far beyond our personal knowledge." 
Again he says : " Faith collects round our observational knowl- 
edge and even around the conclusions reached by inference." 
His examples of primitive faiths are our beliefs in the infinity 
of time and space, and in infinity as an attribute of the nature 
of the Deity. They are "beliefs gathering round space, time, 
and the infinite." , 

The third class of primitive convictions are called "primi- 
tive judgments," and have for their objects the relations of the 
things with which our cognitions are conversant; and they 
arise from a power in the mind to anticipate, to the extent of 
looking for, certain necessary relations among objects, such 
as their necessary relations in space and time, the facts, for 
example, that the straight line is the shortest- distance between 



33 2 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



two points, and that two straight lines cannot inclose a space, 
and the like. 

Such are the author's analysis and description of our 
primitive convictions, the tests of which are, first, their self- 
evidence; secondly, and dependent on this, their necessity; 
and thirdly, their catholicity. Self-evidence is the fact that the 
conviction exists in our own minds and exists independently of 
any other facts. Necessity of belief or the irresistible charac- 
ter of the conviction follows, according to the author, from 
this self-evidence. " I would not," he says, " ground the evi- 
dence on the necessity of belief, but I would ascribe the irre- 
sistible nature of the conviction to the self-evidence. As the 
necessity flows from the self-evidence, so it may become a test 
of it, and a test not difficult of application." Catholicity is 
also a derivative test, and, "when conjoined with necessity, 
may determine very readily and precisely whether a conviction 
be intuitive;" but all these tests "apply directly only to indi- 
vidual convictions. To the generalized expression of them 
the tests apply only mediately, and on the supposition and 
condition that the formulae are the proper expression of the 
spontaneous perceptions." Originally these convictions are 
laws of the perceptive faculties guiding their action, though 
not determining their objects. Their objects are really discov- 
ered, and the conviction is primarily held, only in respect to 
particular perceptions or judgments. Generalizations are then 
made, but they are generalizations "of convictions in our own 
minds, each of which carries necessity in it." There are, 
therefore, according to the author, two fundamentally distinct 
kinds of generalization, and in this respect his doctrine is quite 
original. Laws or general facts may be derived from an expe- 
rience, necessarily limited, of facts which are either inferences 
more or less perfectly drawn from intuitive perceptions, or 
else facts at which no power of the mind "looks" intuitively, 
but which find their way into the mind by the force of repeat- 
ed experiences. These are laws which say nothing about the 
possible; they only testify of the actual. But the laws which 
are immediate generalizations from intuitive perceptions and 
judgments "are of a higher and deeper nature; they are gen- 



McCOSH ON INTUITIONS. ^ 

eralizations of convictions carrying necessity with them, and a 
consequent universality in their very nature." 

This is briefly our author's system, which he proceeds to 
apply to the various problems of metaphysics, such as the 
reality of cause and substance, and the self, and the external 
world. In ingenuity this theory appears to us to exceed any- 
thing which has come from the Scottish school, and in pliancy 
it exceeds, we think, any system which has ever been pro- 
pounded. The extremes of philosophy are avoided by it with 
surprising agility. If any proposition be laid down as uni- 
versally true from which logical consequences of a heterodox 
character are deducible, this system affords the means of mod- 
ifying the proposition without impairing in any measure the 
evidence of its universality, since the infallible powers do not 
testify to the truth of any formula immediately, but only in so 
far as the formula represents the particular decisions of the 
mind. If, on the other hand, the "sceptic" calls in question 
the universality of any truth on the ground that the mind is 
cognizant only of the particular, or doubts the necessity of a 
belief on the ground that all experience is of the contingent, 
our author admits his grounds but denies that his conclusions 
follow, since universality and necessity do not come from the 
particulars of contingent experience as such, but from the pow- 
ers of the mind looking through these into reality, and decid- 
ing absolutely only in regard to the particulars. 

It is to be regretted, however, that the author does not give 
us a more explicit account of what he means by such expres- 
sions as "primitive particular convictions carrying necessity 
with them, and a consequent universality in their very nature." 
In all the definitions of necessity with which we are acquaint- 
ed, we have nowhere found it extended beyond the facts and 
the logical consequences of the facts in which it is supposed 
to exist primitively. That the universal does not follow log- 
ically from the particular or from any number of particulars, 
is what the author strenuously maintains. How, then, do the 
particulars carry in them the necessity of the universal ? for 
this is what we understand the author's expressions to mean. 
How unless it be that the particulars are known simply as 



334 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

instances of the universal, the truth of which we possess as an 
independent knowledge? But such an independent knowl- 
edge of the universal the author as strenuously denies. The 
universal comes to consciousness, he thinks, only through the 
particulars, yet not by the way of suggestion or an awakening 
of a dormant truth, but rather as a fact which the particular 
contains in itself. It is not, according to the author, from the 
objects of intuition on one hand, nor from the powers of intu- 
ition on the other, that the truth of a universal proposition 
becomes known. This is obtained by the generalization of 
particular decisions of the mind. In the general maxim the 
mind recognizes what it has previously cognized in each and 
every one of the particular cases. The underived necessity 
of the particular conviction is somehow translated into the 
universal truth of the general maxim. 

The author probably attaches to the word "necessity" a 
peculiar sense, as something more than mere cogency of be- 
lief, though he nowhere defines it in any other signification. 
There is a real and important logical distinction involved in 
this word, which renders the author's theory intelligible enough, 
though quite a different doctrine from what he intends to set 
forth. There is a distinction in the logical use of the word 
necessity, as opposed to contingency, which relates not to the 
cogency of the belief with which a fact is held, but to the 
connection of the fact itself with other facts in our experience. 
When we say that "anything must be or must be so and so," 
we mean to express something different from the statement 
that " this thing is or is so and so;" yet this difference does 
not refer to the originality, simplicity, or cogency of our belief 
in the statement. The copulas must be and cannot be involve 
in them universal propositions, though they connect only indi- 
vidual or particular terms. They mean that the truth they 
predicate is unconditional — is independent of any other facts ; 
that there exists nothing to prevent the thing from being, or 
being so and so; or that the particular fact does not de- 
pend on any conditions which we can suppose from the evi- 
dence of experience to be variable. From the particular 
proposition, " These two straight lines cannot inclose a space," 






McCOSH ON INTUITIONS. 



335 



may be deduced, through the universality implied in the cop- 
ula, the universal proposition, " No two straight lines can in- 
close a space." For "cannot" here means that there are no 
conditions, or supposable variations of conditions, which will 
make a closed figure of these two lines. But the evidence on 
which such a fact rests will be equally good for any other two 
straight lines, since a change from these to another pair will 
not affect the conditions on which the truth of the particular 
case depends. Hence, "no pair of straight lines can inclose a 
space." This follows from the unconditionalness of a particu- 
lar fact — not from the cogency of our belief in it. This co- 
gency is quite another affair. 

By overlooking the universal, which is implied in an un- 
conditional, particular proposition, our author has sought for 
the origin of the corresponding explicit universal in the char- 
acter of our particular convictions as mental acts ; whereas 
this character of universality really depends on the relations 
of particular facts to our experiences generally. We, there- 
fore, come back to the difficulty, still unsolved, as to how we 
derive universality from a limited experience. Upon this Dr. 
McCosh lays down the usual dictum of his school. He says 
that "a very wide and uniform experience would justify a 
general expectation but not a necessary conviction ; and this 
experience is liable to be disturbed at any time by a new 
occurrence inconsistent with what has been previously known 
to us." But whence this liability? On what evidence is it 
supposed ? Are we informed of it by an intuition or by 
experience ? If by the former, then we have intuitions about 
other generalizations than universal ones, which is contrary to 
our author's theory. If by the latter, then our experience is 
not uniform, which is contrary to his special hypothesis. As 
he, therefore, shuts himself off from both these sources of in- 
formation on the subject, we are left no alternative but to con- 
clude that his statement about the liability of our uniform 
experiences to be disturbed is wholly gratuitous and a begging 
of the. question. Or perhaps he means that propositions 
which we do not feel obliged to believe, though not contra- 
dicted in our experience, should yet, from their analogy with 



33 6 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

others which are occasionally contradicted, be regarded as 
liable to exception. But again we demand, Whence is the 
force of this analogy ? What right have we to draw such a 
conclusion ? Is it not also a virtual begging of the question ? 
For, suppose it true, what the opposite school of philosophy 
teach, that there exist certain universal facts, not born into 
the mind either as innate ideas or as laws of its faculties, 
but existing as the universal circumstances into which the 
mind is born. There could be no exceptions to the uniformity 
of our experience of such facts, even if there were no ne- 
cessity in our convictions of them; and although, as our 
author's school believe, we always do have necessary convic- 
tions of such facts and of no others, the doctrine must rest, 
after all, on the evidence of induction — on the observation 
that the mark of necessity always does attend uncontradicted 
truths and no others. But the history of science as well as 
the discussions of philosophy contradict this induction. 
"There was a time," says Mr. Mill, "when men of the 
most cultivated intellects and the most emancipated from the 
dominion of early prejudice, would not credit the existence 
of antipodes." Our author, after quoting this example, ob- 
serves : " I acknowledge that the tests of intuition have often 
been loosely stated, and that they have also been illegitimately 
applied, just as the laws of derivative logic have been. But 
they have seldom or never been put in the ambiguous form in 
which Mr. Mill understands them, and it is only in such a 
shape that they could ever be supposed to cover such beliefs 
as the rejection of the rotundity of the earth. ... It is not 
the power of conception, in the sense either of phantasm 
or notion, that should be used as a test, but it is self-evidence 
with necessity." He then proceeds to understate the facts 
of the case thus: "There was a time when even educated 
men felt a difficulty in conceiving the antipodes, because it 
seemed contrary not to intuition but to their limited experi- 
ence;' but surely no one knowing anything of philosophy 
or of what he was speaking would have maintained, at any 
time, that it was self-evident that the earth could not be 
round." On this we have to observe, in the first place, that 



McCOSH ON INTUITIONS. ^ 

the difficulty of conceiving the antipodes was not, as the 
author appears to think, a difficulty of conceiving the ro- 
tundity of the earth, but a difficulty of conceiving men stand- 
ing on the opposite side of the round earth, without having 
their feet stuck on, like flies to a ceiling, and this difficulty 
was such that these philosophers could not be made to credit 
its possibility ; in other words, they had one of Dr. McCosh's 
intuitions on the matter. Mr. Herbert Spencer, who follows 
the Scottish school in positing belief as a valid and ultimate 
test of the truths of universals, attempts to explain away this 
historical example by limiting the test to what is simple and 
" undecomposable," and he supposes the conception of the 
antipodes to have been difficult or impossible to the ancients, 
and the fact to have been incredible, on account of the com- 
plexity of the conception. But we suspect the case to have 
been just the reverse of this. The antipodes were incredible 
to the ancients because they conceived the fact as a simple and 
unconditional one, and in contradiction of the equally simple 
and unconditional fact of their own standing on the earth. 
And it is because we in modern times are able to resolve both 
facts into the conditions on which they depend that they are 
seen not to be contradictory. So long as "down" was con- 
ceived as an absolute direction in the universe, dependent on 
nothing but its own nature, so long were the antipodes in- 
credible and stood in contradiction of as simple, original, and 
necessary a belief as " that two straight lines cannot inclose a 
space." In short, the ancients had in this case all the tests 
which the Scottish school apply as ultimate in the ascertain- 
ment of truth. 

But what can be more ultimate ? What other tests are 
there ? this school demand. Perhaps there are no tests of a 
general character, or of simple and easy application; but, 
without awaiting an answer, this school describe all those 
who oppose them as "sceptics," deniers of truth; whereas 
what the so-called "sceptics," "idealists," and "sensationalists" 
deny is only the validity of these tests as ultimate ones. 
What nobody doubts or calls in question, that, of course, 
nobody wants a test for, though it may be a useful and in- 

J 5 



33* 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



structive exercise in philosophy to generalize the conditions 
of ultimate credibility. But such conditions are illegitimately 
used as an appeal from the doubts or questions of philosophy. 
The Scottish school, half aware of this, commonly describe 
the opinions and doubts from which they appeal to intuition 
and common sense as either insincere or as positively wicked, 
and our author, in particular, regards all the errors and mis- 
takes of philosophers as coming from a perverse will, from 
their not yielding to their intuitive, heaven-born convictions. 
He describes his opponents as "opponents of intuitive truth," 
whereas they only oppose the theory which regards our sim- 
plest and most certain convictions as derived from a different 
source from that which assures us of all else that we know, 
namely, our experience of the world and of our own thoughts. 
The "sceptic" does not deny that our knowledges are pro- 
duced according to laws which may be discovered in them by 
comparison and generalization, and his doubts and questions 
about metaphysical truths, such as the relation of cause and 
effect and the existence of the external world, are doubts and 
questions, not about the reality of these knowledges, but 
about the kind of reality they have, and this must be deter- 
mined, he thinks, by the nature of the evidence on which 
they rest. 

The "sceptic" does not deny that many of his beliefs are 
unconditional or necessary. He only denies that this quality 
is a proof of their simplicity or originality, and on this ac- 
count he doubtless holds to them somewhat less willfully. By 
necessity he means unconditionalness, Or that the fact is inde- 
pendent of all other known facts and conditions. Whatever 
the word necessity means more than this, comes, he thinks, 
from a rhetorical fervor of assertion; as if one should say, 
"This 71111st be so," meaning that he is determined that it shall 
be so. This sort of self-determination in their convictions 
the Scottish school doubtless have, and they are probably 
correct in not ascribing it to the evidence of experience ; but 
then they are wrong in thinking that it comes from the reason, 
since, in fact, its real origin is in the will. 

The appeal from the "sceptic's" questions to common sense 



McCOSH ON INTUITIONS. 



339 



is inept in two important particulars. In the first place, the 
appeal is an ignoratio ele?ichi, for the questions are not ques- 
tions of facts but questions of their philosophical explanations ; 
questions of the origin and nature of the facts as knowledges. 
These have nothing to do with the cogency or simplicity 
of our beliefs, except to explain them. When the "sceptic" 
asks why some beliefs are so much more cogent than others, 
he is accused by this school of doubting whether they really 
are so, and he is referred for an explanation to the very facts 
which he seeks to explain. But, in the second place, no dis- 
cussion is legitimate which appeals to an oracle not acknowl- 
edged by both parties. The proper appeal in all disputes 
is to common principles explicitly announced and understood 
in the same sense by both disputants. It is common, indeed, 
in physical investigations to speak of an appeal to experiment 
or to observation; still, by this is meant, not an appeal from 
anybody's decision or opinion, but from everybody's ignorance 
of the facts of the case. The facts in philosophy are so noto- 
rious that this sort of appeal is not required. What is sought 
by the so-called "sceptic" is the nature of the fact, its ex- 
planation ; and he is not deterred from the inquiry by the 
seeming simplicity of the fact, but proceeds, like the astron- 
omer, and the physicist, and the naturalist, by framing and 
verifying hypotheses to reduce the simple seeming to its sim- 
pler reality. In this the idealist does not deny that there 
is an existence properly enough called the external world, but 
he wishes to ascertain the nature of this reality by studying 
what the notion of externality really implies ; what are the 
circumstances attending its rise in our thoughts, and its proba- 
ble growth in our experience. In this research he does not 
forget that all explanation ultimately rests on the inexplicable ; 
that "there is no appeal from our . faculties generally;" he 
only denies that the present simplicity of a fact in our 
thoughts is a test of its primitive simplicity in the growth 
of the mind. For such a test would have deterred the as- 
tronomer from questioning the Ptolemaic system and the 
stability of the earth, or the physicist from calling in question 
nature's abhorrence of a vacuum. 






34° 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



The oracular deliverances of consciousness, even when con- 
sulted by the most approved maxims of interrogation, cannot 
present a fact in the isolated, untheoretical form which criti- 
cism and scientific investigation demand. Philosophers are 
not the only theorizers. The vulgar, and the philosopher 
himself as one of them, have certain theoretical prepossessions, 
natural explanations and classifications of the phenomena 
which are habitually brought to their notice — such as the 
apparent movements of the heavens, and the axioms of hourly 
experience. How are these natural theories to be eliminated ? 
How unless by criticism — by just such criticisms as those 
of the great "sceptic" Hume? But while the criticisms of 
Hume awoke the philosopher of Konigsberg from his " dog- 
matic slumber," and gave rise to the greatest philosophical 
movement of modern times, it appeared to affect the "scep- 
tic's" own countrymen only to plunge them into a profound 
dogmatic coma. The "sceptic" seemed to these philosophers 
to deny truth itself, and to demand a proof for everything. 
"There are truths," says our author, "above probation, but 
there are none above examination, and the truths above proof 
are those which bear inspection the best." This is the key to 
the whole Scottish method. The inspection of truths as to 
their credibility seems to these thinkers to be the chief busi- 
ness of philosophy. As if truths were on trial for their lives ! 
As if the "sceptic" desired worse of them than their better 
acquaintance ! 

An appeal to an oracle silences but does not settle disputes. 
Principles to start from must be those for which no explana- 
tion is supposable. The existence of undisputed and indis- 
putable facts is denied by no philosopher, and every true 
philosopher seeks for such facts; the "idealists" and the 
"sensationalists" as well as the rest. But idealism was ever a 
stumbling-block to the Scottish school, so much so that their 
intuitions seem to spring directly from an innate inability in 
the thinkers of that nation to understand this doctrine. They 
appear unable to distinguish between questions concerning 
the origin of an idea and a doubt of its reality. It is much 
as if a Ptolemaic astronomer should accuse a Copernican 



McCOSH ON INTUITIONS. 34 j 

of denying or ignoring the visible changes in the aspects 
of the heavens. 

The "sceptic" does not doubt peremptorily, but always for 
cause. He does not profess to doubt realities or principles, 
but only whether certain truths are principles or simple cog- 
nitions, and whether they are cognitions having the kind of 
reality they are vulgarly supposed to have. There would be 
a sort of grim humor in our author's discussion of "what are 
we to do to the sceptic ? " and what we should and what we 
should not do for him, were it not that the discussion is too 
obviously a serious one. The author does not see that what 
we ought to do is to try to understand the "sceptic," and 
what we ought not to do is to misrepresent him. 

'" Precipitate and incorrect as Hume's conclusion was " con- 
cerning the possibility of a science of metaphysics, "yet," 
says Kant, " it was at least founded on investigation, and this 
investigation was well worthy that all the best intellects of his 
time should have united successfully to solve the problem, and, 
if possible, in the temper in "which he proposed it, for from 
this a total reform of the science must soon have arisen. 
Only the unpropitious fate of his metaphysic would have it 
that it should be understood by none. One cannot without a 
certain feeling of pain see how utterly his adversaries, Reid, 
Oswald, Beattie, and later Priestly also, missed the point of 
his problem. By continually taking for granted just what he 
doubted, but on the other hand proving with vehemence, 
and, what is more, with great indecorum, what it never came 
into his head to doubt, they so mistook his hint towards im- 
provement that everything remained in the old state, as though 
nothing had happened." — [Prolegomena to every Future Meta- 
physic which can be put forth as a science. Introduction.] 

We will only add that our author has not improved upon 
his predecessors. 



MASSON'S RECENT BRITISH PHILOSOPHY* 

With the true metaphysician the real motive of his pursuit 
is, of course, his belief in its success and in the value of the 
truths, as such, which he aims to establish. But, in addition 
to this motive, many minds discover a certain dignity and ab- 
solute worth in the pursuit itself — in the exercise of powers 
which, though they should fail of their end, are regarded as 
the noblest and the most distinctive pf the tendencies native to 
the human mind. To this somewhat sentimental view of the 
value of metaphysical studies, Sir William Hamilton gave his 
powerful support, and his disciple, Mr. Masson, urges it in 
apology for his Review, t The " greatest and most character- 
istic merit of Sir William Hamilton among his contemporaries 
consisted," according to Mr. Masson, "in his having been, 
while he lived, the most ardent and impassioned devotee of 
the useless within Great Britain." Mr. Masson does not tell 
us whether Hamilton has since his death been surpassed in 
this excellence; but on no point in metaphysics does Mr. Mas- 
son himself take a more decided stand than on this its claim 
to be a very ennobling pursuit. Of a nation which should 
cease to care for metaphysics, he says that it " has the mark of 
the beast upon it, and is going the way of all brutality." 

On more specific points of metaphysical doctrine, Mr. Mas- 
son's opinions are not so distinctly set forth. He manifests, 
however, a certain affection for transcendentalism, and a confi- 
dence that there is something in it. But his aim in this volume 
is not so much to set forth his own opinions as to sketch the 
relations of the different philosophical systems that have been 

* From The Nation, November 15, 1866. 

t "Recent British Philosophy: A Review, with criticisms; including some comments 
on Mr. Mill's answer to Sir William Hamilton. By David Masson." New York: 1866. 



MASSOWS RECENT BRITISH PHILOSOPHY. 



343 



most influential in Great Britain during the past thirty years, 
with reference chiefly to the writings of Sir William Hamilton, 
Mr. Mill, and Mr. Carlyle. 

For this purpose he lays down, first, a scheme for the classi- 
fication of possible metaphysical opinions, following Sir Wil- 
liam Hamilton's method, and, for the most part, adopting 
Hamilton's divisions and nomenclature. An admiring imitator 
of Hamilton's emphatic style, he divides and defines with a 
firmness, rather than a fineness, of discrimination. Starting with 
an a priori scheme of possible metaphysical opinions, he tries 
the doctrines of his three philosophers by it, and assigns them 
to their appropriate classes. A convenient original feature in 
his scheme enables him to accomplish this with considerable 
success. He distinguishes three forms of metaphysical belief, 
or three generic grounds of difference in philosophical opinion. 
A philosopher's opinions may belong to his "psychological 
theory," to his "cosmological conception," or to his "ontolog- 
ical faith." If his opinion is given in answer to the question, 
" Is any portion of our knowledge of a different origin from 
the rest, and of a different degree of validity in consequence 
of that different origin ? " or " Are there any notions, princi- 
ples, or elements in our minds which could never have been 
fabricated out of any amount of experience, but must have 
been bedded in the very structure of the mind itself?" — then 
his opinion will be the philosopher's "psychological theory," 
and he will be an "empiricist" or a "transcendentalism" accord- 
ing as he answers these questions in the negative or affirmative. 

The most curious and original part of Mr. Masson's scheme 
is the doctrine that the philosopher's "cosmological concep- 
tion" may be quite independent of his psychological theory;" 
that, in fact, any one may have a very distinct "cosmological 
conception" without any "psychological theory" at all. "A 
psychological theory" is a learned luxury, but every one has 
some sort of " cosmological conception " which is bodied forth 
in his sensuous image of the universe as a whole, and made 
up of his ideas of religion and history and the eternal verities 
of the world. 

Philosophers are fundamentally divided, as to their " cosmo- 



344 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



logical conceptions," into realists and idealists, and subdivided 
into "materialistic realists" and "dualistic realists;" or "nat- 
ural realists," on one hand, and into "constructive idealists" 
and "pure idealists," on the other. These four subdivisions 
are flanked by two extreme classes of opinion : nihilism or 
non-substantialism, on one hand, and pantheism or the "abso- 
lute identity" doctrine, on the other. These extreme classes 
involve, however, ontological considerations, and depend on 
the third generic ground of difference in philosophical opinion 
— on the philosopher's "ontological faith." 

Ontology means the science of the supernatural, of the 
non-phenomenal. Can there be such a science? This ques- 
tion admits, according to Mr. Masson, of a division into two : . 
" Is there a supernatural, and can the supernatural be known ? " 
By the great majority of philosophers these questions are 
answered in the order in which Mr. Masson puts them : the 
first in the affirmative and the second in the negative ; though 
it is a puzzle to the sceptic to understand how men can con- 
fess a belief in anything of which they profess themselves 
utterly ignorant. But Mr. Masson offers an ingenious ex- 
planation. " Ontological faith," when it exists, depends not 
on evidence, of any kind — the word faith connotes that — but 
on the existence in the philosopher of what Mr. Masson calls, 
euphemistically, "the ontological passion," "the rage of on- 
tology," or "the sentiment of ontology." "What has genius 
been," he exclaims, "what has religious propagandism been, 
but a metaphysical drunkenness ? " In its manifestation this 
passion appears to us very nearly akin to what, in the modern 
sense of the word, is expressed by "dogmatism." A dogma- 
tist is one who is fond of strong assertions, who concludes 
with his will, and reaches his conclusion by going to it when 
he finds no power, natural or supernatural, by which the 
mountain can be forced to come to him. But Mr. Masson 
appears innocently unconscious of this synonym. 

By the help of the "ontological passion" and his scheme 
of classification he discovers the relations between the opin- 
ions of his three philosophers, especially between those of 
Hamilton and Mill, "one of whom may be described as a 



MASSOATS RECENT BRITISH PHIIOSOPHY. 345 

transcendental natural realist, forswearing speculative ontol- 
ogy, but with much of the ontological passion in his temper; 
and the other as an empirical idealist, also repudiating on- 
tology, but doing so with the ease of one in whom the on- 
tological feeling was at any rate suppressed or languid." 

The earlier chapters of Mr. Masson's book, which had gone 
to press before the publication of Mill's "Examination of 
Hamilton," anticipate two of Mr. Mill's principal criticisms. 
The apparent discrepancy between Hamilton's philosophy 
of the conditioned, or doctrine of relative knowledge, and his 
natural realism, or doctrine of the immediate perception of 
the primary qualities of matter, is explained by Mr. Masson 
by referring the former to Hamilton's ontological doctrine, 
and the latter to his " cosmological conception;" and the 
apparent inconsistency of Hamilton's philosophy of the con- 
ditioned with his theological positions is explained, as we have 
seen, by the degree to which he w r as possessed with the " on- 
tological passion." 

"Transcendental natural realism in Hamilton, announcing 
itself as anti-ontological but with strong theological sympa- 
thies, and empirical, constructive idealism in Mill, also an- 
nouncing itself as anti-ontological, but consenting to leave the 
main theological questions open on pretty strict conditions — 
such," it seems to Mr. Masson, "were the two philosophical 
angels that began to contend formally for the soul of Britain 
about thirty years ago, and that are still contending for as 
much of it as has not in the mean time transported itself 
beyond the reach of either." Whether any of it has done so, 
and how much, and where it has gone, are matters which Mr. 
Masson proceeds to discuss in his chapter on "the effects 
of recent scientific conceptions ' on philosophy." Having in 
this chapter got off the scaffolding of his classification, he 
appears to us to have fallen into the most bewildering confu- 
sion. That part of the soul of Britain which appears to him 
to have got beyond the reach of traditional differences in 
philosophy, has done so, it seems to us, by confounding them 
with the vaguer scientific speculations which, according to 
Mr. Masson, have wrought this great change. 



346 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSION'S. 

The idea that the world existed for innumerable ages with- 
out sentient life; that this life was gradually developed until 
it appeared in the full splendor of the human soul ; that the 
earth and its history are but accidents in a grander cosmos, 
and that it and the cosmos are destined to an ultimate and 
universal collapse, to be refunded into a new homogeneous 
nebula, and to furnish elements to a new creation — this evolu- 
tion from nebula, and this dissolution into nebula, repeated 
without end, making sentient life, the animal nature, and the 
human mind only phases of a continuous evolution — such 
ideas, our author thinks, make metaphysics stand aghast. 
What becomes of a priori and a posteriori, of transcendental- 
ism and empiricism, when everything is a product and at the 
same time a factor; when nothing is primordial but nebula, 
and nebula neither matter nor mind, but the undifferentiated 
root of both ? But Mr. Masson's faith in transcendentalism, 
as he understands it, is proof against this new phase of 
thought. He thinks that under these new scientific concep- 
tions transcendentalism and empiricism go a neck-and-neck 
race back through the ages, but that transcendentalism will 
get ahead at the nebula. 

Now, in all this Mr. Masson has confused the philosophical 
dogma of an a prio?i determination of knowledge with the 
doctrine of heredity, the doctrine, to wit, that dispositions, 
tendencies to action, and perhaps, also, certain elements of 
knowledge, are derived by birth from the characters and 
mental powers of progenitors. He explicitly identifies the 
two by affirming that the doctrine of heredity is inconsistent 
with empiricism in philosophy. For this confusion he is 
probably indebted to Mr. Spencer, to whom the world owes 
the introduction in philosophy of these confounding scientific 
conceptions. Mr. Spencer and Mr. Masson do not appear to 
be aware that, by "an a priori ground of knowledge," no 
reference is meant in philosophy to physical or physiological 
antecedency or causation, but only to the logical grounds 
of belief, or to the evidence of certain general propositions. 
The principal question of philosophy is, whether any general 
truth is known by any mind except in consequence — the 



MA SSON' S RE CENT BRITISH PHIL OSOPH Y. 347 

evidential consequence — of particular experiences, or else de- 
ductively. If it could be made out that certain general 
elements of knowledge are born in any mind in consequence 
of particular experiences in its progenitors, this would still be 
empiricism, and Mr. Spencer therefore professes empiricism, 
though he does not appear to know it. For transcendentalism 
maintains that certain so-called a priori elements of knowl- 
edge or general truths could not be vouched for by any 
amount of particular experience; and it is non-essential 
whether this experience be in the offspring or in its pro- 
genitors, even back to the nebula. Mr. Spencer and Mr. 
Masson have, therefore, got beyond the reach of "the two 
philosophical angels " only by getting confused by their scien- 
tific Conceptions. 

These nebulous conceptions have also dimmed Mr. Mas- 
son's vision of another metaphysical doctrine, that of the 
cosmothetic idealists, as Hamilton called them, or, as Mr. 
Masson prefers to call them, the constructive idealists. Either 
he was misled by his own terminology, or for some other 
reason, he has assumed that the idealism of the majority 
of philosophers, including Mr. Mill, presupposed the existence 
of a perceiving mind to constitute a cosmos. To constitute a 
conceived cosmos, or the cosmos as known, it is undoubtedly 
necessary that, a mind should exist to know it, or to be aware 
of its effects upon mind ; but that the contemplation of such 
a mind is necessary to the absolute existence of a cosmos can 
be inferred from nothing in the doctrine of idealism ; and it is 
only inferable, so far as we can see, from the connotation 
of the name which Mr. Masson gives to the more common 
form of the doctrine — from the name constructive idealism. 
He is puzzled to conceive how, on the idealist's theory, the 
world could have had a progress and a history prior to its 
development of a perceiving mind, except, perhaps, in the 
mind of its Creator, who might be supposed to "have con- 
tinued the necessary contemplation." 

We had before supposed that the scientific conceptions, 
which appear to have befogged our author, had not attained 
to such a degree of nebulosity as to represent the universe at 



348 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

any time as of a nature incompatible with the existence of a 
perceiving mind, however unfit it may have been for the 
sustenance of the animal body with its perceptive organs ; 
and we imagined that the history of the progress contem- 
plated in these conceptions was one which was conceived as 
it would have appeared had it really existed and had minds 
existed to perceive it. But if the regress towards the nebula 
carry us back towards a state of things which would have 
been not only inhospitable but also incompatible with a dis- 
tinct mental existence, then we confess that either idealism or 
else these scientific conceptions are much at fault. But, inas- 
much as these are still conceptions, however indistinct, we 
cannot hesitate to give credit to idealism rather than to such 
self-annihilating thoughts. Thoughts of a state of things in 
which thought was impossible must be very transcendental 
indeed. 

Independently of the perturbing influence of modern sci- 
entific conceptions, Mr. Masson's account of recent British 
philosophy is not free from confusion. In revising in his last 
chapter his classification of Mill's opinions as set forth in the 
"Examination" of Hamilton's doctrines, Mr. Masson ventures 
to maintain that Mr. Mill's empiricism is inconsistent with the 
position of the positivists, that the main theological questions 
should be open questions in the most advanced school of 
philosophy. He "can see no interpretation of Mr. Mill's 
fundamental principle of empiricism, according to which those 
questions of a supernatural, which he would keep open, ought 
not to be, at once and forever, closed questions." 

A question is closed when we have a knowledge precluding 
the possibility of evidence to the contrary, or where we are 
ignorant beyond the possibility of enlightenment. An on- 
tological knowledge of the supernatural, or even of the nat- 
ural — that is, a knowledge of anything existing by itself and 
independently of its effects on us — is, according to the ex- 
periential philosophy, a closed question. But a phenomenal 
knowledge of the supernatural is nevertheless a question still y 
open until it be shown, beyond the possibility of rational or 
well-founded doubt, that the law of causation is, or is not, 



MASSON'S RECENT BRITISH PHIIOSOPHY. 349 

universal, and that absolute personal agency or free undeter- 
mined voluntary actions have, or have not, determined at 
any time the order or constitution of nature — difficult ques- 
tions, it is true, but still open ones. Mr. Masson implicitly 
identifies theology with ontology — the supernatural with the 
non-phenomenal — and thus implicitly denies that anything 
can be known of the supernatural, unless it be known 
absolutely, or in itself. This is to stake all religious in- 
quiry on the truth of transcendental ontology, a position 
which Mr. Masson, as a liberal historian of philosophy, can- 
not affirm as the final conclusion of his inquiry, or as war- 
ranted by any reasons he has advanced. 



MANSEL'S REPLY TO MILL* 

That the two great schools of philosophy will never be able 
to make much impression on one another by way of criticism 
seems pretty evident from the history of the long debate the 
last words of which reach us in Mr. Mansel's restatement and 
defense of Sir William Hamilton's philosophy.f The only 
real strength of either school appears to be in its ability to 
hold and fill the minds of its disciples to the exclusion of the 
other, not by logical refutations but by competitive .rivalry in 
meeting the intellectual demands of the thinker. Fevy minds 
could be tempted, even were they competent to do so, to 
stand in fair judgment between these contestants, and the only 
feasible course of this sort ever recommended was that of 
Pyrrho, who advised his disciples to stand aside rather and to 
attend only to the practical questions of life. For, after all, 
the intellectual demands which these philosophies are calcu- 
lated to meet are creations of the philosophies themselves, 
and once created they find their food only in the parent 
thought. Thus, the main summary objection which the meta- 
physical spirit makes to the theories of the sceptical school is, 
that they fail to answer the questions which the metaphysical 
school has started. And the main objection of the sceptical 
spirit to metaphysics is, that these questions are gratuitous, 
idle, and foolish. 

A compromise between the two schools was nevertheless 
attempted by Sir William Hamilton in his "Philosophy of the 

* From The Nation, January 10, 1867. 

t "The Philosophy of the Conditioned; comprising some Remarks on Sir William 
Hamilton's Philosophy and on Mr. J. S. Mill's Examination of that Philosophy. P>y 
H. L. Mansel, B.D." 1866. Pp. vii. and 189. Reprinted, with additions, from the 
"Contemporary Review." 



M ANSEL'S REPLY TO MILL. 351 

Conditioned." This philosophy allows the validity of meta- 
physical problems ; allows that the terms and positions of the 
orthodox philosophy mean something possibly real ; but main- 
tains at the same time that these refer to unattainable objects, 
and that the questions are unanswerable so far as human 
powers of comprehension can render the facts evident or even 
intelligible as such. This philosophy is in strict accordance 
with the teachings of Catholic theology from the earliest 
times, and it gives great prominence to an essential position 
of this theology — the antithesis of reason and faith, or the 
doctrine of a difference in kind between knowledge and belief. 
The kind of entertainment which, according to the "Phil- 
osophy of the Conditioned," it is possible for the mind to 
have of the ideas of metaphysics, far from being a conviction 
resulting from direct or intuitive evidence, is not even a concep- 
tion of the facts as possibly true. A conception of the terms 
and of the propositions as such is, of course, not only allowed, 
but is an essential position of this philosophy. That which is 
regarded as inconceivable is the union of the terms of these 
propositions in reality as well as in form — in the facts which 
are supposed to be stated in the propositions. That such 
a fact can be entertained or assented to is the common ground 
of this philosophy and orthodox theology. "Faith" or "sim- 
ple belief" is the name of this assent. But inasmuch as this 
assent is entirely independent of knowledge or probable evi- 
dence, an independent ground for it is required among the 
native powers of the mind, and this is also called "faith" or 
"belief." Knowledge and partial evidence may aid in fashion- 
ing our ideas of metaphysical facts, but are not regarded as 
the grounds of our assent to them. 

To this extent the "Philosophy of the Conditioned" is 
nothing more than the doctrine of orthodox theology. But 
its essential feature is this : The faith which is ultimate and 
independent of knowledge is not in this philosophy a senti- 
ment, the issue of the heart, or a conviction having its ground 
in aspiration, love, and devotion, but it subsists in the cold 
light of the intellect itself, where alone intellectual philosophy 
could profess to find it. It subsists as a logical necessity 



352 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

of thinking something to exist which is unthinkable — not 
merely something which we have not yet thought of — not the 
unknown simply, but the unknowable. Sir William Hamilton 
professes to demonstrate this necessity in the passage so often 
quoted from his review of Cousin. 

"The conditioned is the mean between two extremes — two 
inconditionates, exclusive of each other, neither of which can 
be conceived as possible, but of which, on the principles of con- 
tradiction and excluded middle, one must be admitted as nec- 
essary" etc. This application of the logical laws of contra- 
diction and excluded middle is the gist of the philosophy 
of the conditioned; and to this Mr. Mill, in his "Examina- 
tion" of Hamilton's doctrines, has distinctly replied to the 
following effect: What is the evidence of the impossibility 
of a middle ground between contradictory propositions ? 
Simply this : that in all that we know, and in all which we 
can conceive as possible, there is no such middle ground. 
What, then, is the evidence in regard to that which we cannot 
know and cannot conceive as possible ? It is clear that on 
their proper evidence the laws of excluded middle and con- 
tradiction cannot be extended to such cases, and that such an 
extension of them is purely gratuitous. What hinders, either 
in the laws of thought or in our knowledge of things, that 
there should be an inconceivable middle ground between 
inconceivable contradictories ? What hinders that both of 
them or that neither of them should be true, or that truth 
should be wholly included in what can be understood as true ? 

To this refutation of the main position of the philosophy 
of the conditioned, Mr. Mansel makes no reference in his 
reply, except in a very remote manner, in a passage in which 
he sneers at Mr. Mill's apparent ignorance of Hamilton's 
doctrine of the reality of space. A favorite illustration with 
Hamilton of his laws of the conditioned is the equal incon- 
ceivability, as he asserts, of infinite space and space absolutely 
bounded, one of which, on the ground of their mutual repug- 
nance, must be admitted as real. The fitness of this illustra- 
tion, to say nothing of its truth, depends on its not being 
confined to space as we know it, but on its extension to the 



M ANSEL'S REPLY TO MLLL. 353 

really existent space, or space independent of our knowledge, 
if any such space exists. If no such space exists, then the 
illustration is wholly inapt. Mr. Mill, therefore, very nat- 
urally attributes to Hamilton the only meaning which could 
fit his illustration to its use, and he supposes Hamilton 
to refer to a "noumenon space." Mr. Mill says: "It is 
not merely space as cognizable by our sense, but space 
as it is in itself, which he [Hamilton] affirms must be ei- 
ther of unlimited or of limited extent." "At this sentence," 
exclaims Mr. Mansel, "we fairly stand aghast." "Space as it 
is in itself! The noumenon space! Has Mr. Mill been all 
this while 'examining' Sir William Hamilton's philosophy in 
Utter ignorance that the object of that philosophy is the ' con- 
ditioned in time and space ;' that he accepts Kant's analysis 
of time and space as formal necessities of thought, but pro- 
nounces no opinion whatever as to whether time and space 
can exist as noumena or not?" (p. 138). And so Mr. Man- 
sel runs off on an irrelevant issue from the nearest approach 
he makes to the gist of the matter. 

The first sixty pages of Mr. Mansel's review are devoted to 
a positive exposition of the metaphysical doctrine of the 
"unconditioned," that "highest link in the chain of thought," 
that "absolutely first link in a chain of phenomena" about 
which metaphysicians have gratuitously confused themselves 
for so many ages. Mr. Mansel endeavors to clear up the 
matter by discussing the terms employed in the doctrine, and 
especially the meanings attached to them by Hamilton. He 
then comes to the trial of Mr. Mill's "Examination," and this 
is his indictment : " Not only is Mr. Mill's attack on Hamil- 
ton's philosophy, with the exception of some minor details, 
unsuccessful ; but we are compelled to add that, with regard 
to the three fundamental doctrines of that philosophy — the 
relativity of knowledge, the incognizability of the absolute 
and infinite, and the distinction between reason and faith — 
Mr. Mill has, throughout his criticism, altogether missed the 
meaning of the theories he is attempting to assail " (p. 63). 
More specifically he charges Mr. Mill with ignorance of the 
history of the questions discussed ; with frequent perversions 



354 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

and even inversions of the meanings of the terms employed 
by Hamilton and other metaphysicians, and with an unpar- 
donable want of familiarity with Plato and with the antiquity 
of the doctrines which he discovers as absurdities in Hamilton 
and our author. 

A scholastic display of subtle learning was probably not 
Mr. Mill's object in entering into this debate with the meta- 
physicians. If metaphysical philosophy had been content to 
remain a purely theoretical philosophy, shut up in its own 
technicalities, and in the original Greek; if it had disdained 
to descend into the arena of practical life and to influence 
men's conduct, no really earnest critic, like Mr. Mill, would 
have opposed its pretensions. If it had not translated itself 
into the vernacular, and wrested words of a familiar and 
practical application from their familiar and practical use, and 
thereby sought to enslave the souls of men to a scholastic and 
ecclesiastical authority, no criticisms like Mr. Mill's would 
have disturbed its self-complacency. 

That Pyrrho was wrong in his advice to abstain from such 
disputations, is sufficiently evinced by the influence upon prac- 
tical life which the doctrines of Hamilton and Mansel were 
calculated to exert. "That a true psychology is the indispen- 
sable basis of morals, of politics, of the science and art of 
education ; that the difficulties of metaphysics lie at the root 
of all science ; that these difficulties can only be quieted by 
being resolved, and that until they are resolved — positively, if 
possible, but at any rate negatively — we are never assured 
that any human knowledge, even physical, stands on solid 
foundations;" these are reasons enough for examining the 
pretensions of the metaphysical philosophy; these are the 
sufficient grounds of the practical critic's interest in those 
formidable words, the infinite and the absolute, the chevaux 
de bataille of metaphysics. For these words are also common 
and familiar ones, and are commonly and familiarly used, as 
Mr. Mansel himself admits, in senses different from those 
assigned to them by the metaphysicians; but the conclusions 
drawn from their definitions in metaphysics are inevitably 
interpreted into a practical accordance with the common- 



MANSEVS REPLY TO MILL. y^ 

sense meanings of the words, and hence lead to false judg- 
ments concerning the character of the evidences of religious 
and moral truths. 

Mr. Mill's real end was, therefore, a practical one — to show 
that in the recognized common meanings of these words the 
doctrines of metaphysics make arrant nonsense, and that these 
words have a valid, useful, and intelligible application to the 
most serious practical relations of life, without any reference 
to their use in metaphysics. Mr. Mansel uses the word "ab- 
solute" in a sense different even from Hamilton's, and com- 
plains that Mr. Mill has not given him the benefit of his phil- 
osophically clearer and correcter definition. But we imagine 
that Mr. Mill was more concerned to do justice to the com- 
mon-sense meaning of the word than to Mr. Mansel. 

That the words "infinite" and "absolute," as defined in 
metaphysics, involve contradictions in their definitions, and 
not in the attempt to conceive the reality of the things de- 
fined, is the position which Mr. Mill maintains against the 
philosophy of the conditioned. "The contradictions which 
Mr. Mansel asserts to be involved in the notions do not 
follow," says Mr. Mill, "from an imperfect mode of appre- 
hending the infinite and the absolute, but lie in the definitions 
of them, in the meanings of the words themselves." This 
position Mr. Mansel flatly denies. He holds that these mean- 
ings are perfectly intelligible, and are exactly what are ex- 
pressed by the definitions of the words. To test this, let us 
take an example. " If we could realize in thought infinite 
space," says -an anonymous writer (a diligent student of Sir 
William Hamilton's writings, whom Mr. Mansel quotes with 
approbation), "that conception would be a perfectly definite 
one." The infinite, then, is not the indefinite. It is a unit, a 
whole. But it is without limits. It is, then, a whole without 
limits. But a whole implies limits. We know of no whole 
which has not limits. We can conceive of no w T hole which 
has not limits. Limits, in fact, belong to the essence of every 
whole of which we speak intelligibly. Does not the meta- 
physical idea or definition of infinity involve, therefore, a 
contradiction ? 



356 



PHIL OSOPHICA L DISC USSIONS. 



Of the common idea of the infinite, as involved in the 
concrete example, "infinite space," Mr. Mill says: "The neg- 
ative part of this conception is the absence of bounds. The 
positive is the idea of space, and of space greater than any 
finite space." "This definition of infinite space is," says Mr. 
Mansel, "exactly that which Descartes gives us of indefinite 
extension." But an indefinite extension, according to Des- 
cartes, is that which is capable of unlimited increase, and we 
fail to see the identity of this with Mr. Mill's definition. 
Moreover, according to the metaphysicians, the infinite and 
the finite, being contradictories, include all there is; and as the 
indefinite is not the infinite, it must be some finite. But Mr. 
Mill says that his infinite is greater than any finite. Hqw, 
then, can it be the same as the indefinite? "Greater than 
any finite" excludes the finite as effectually as an absolute 
negation of it, but it has this positive peculiarity, that it 
excludes the finite in an essential and characteristic manner. 
"Greater than" is a much more specific form of denial than 
the "is not" by which the metaphysicians are content to 
distinguish the infinite from the finite. It is this specific and 
characteristic mode of exclusion which constitutes the positive 
part of the abstract conception of the infinite, and, according 
to Mr. Mansel, a positive conception, or the positive part 
of a conception, is that of which we can conceive the manner 
of its realization. It cannot be supposed that Mr. Mansel 
means by this that only those conceptions are positive of 
which we can have examples in intuition, for this would be to 
identify positive conceptions with adequate ones. No one 
asserts that the infinite can be adequately conceived ex- 
cept the "rationalists," to whom Mr. Mill is as much op- 
posed as Hamilton or Mansel; but, as Mr. Mill observes, 
"between a conception which, though inadequate, is real and 
correct as far as it goes, and the impossibility of any concep- 
tion, there is a wide difference." 

The common notion of infinity is not, then, a mere nega- 
tion. It refers to and is related to positive experience, and to 
valid operations of the mind in drawing conclusions from 
experience. It is not the same as the indefinite ; it is not that 



M ANSEL'S REPLY TO MLLL. 357 

to which an unlimited addition is possible, since it is defined 
as the greatest possible, greater than any quantities which can 
be measured or compared by their differences.* The meta- 
physical idea or definition of infinity, on the contrary, in so 
far as it is not merely negative, involves a contradiction, since 
it is asserted to be a definite whole, and, at the same time, to 
be without limits. 

Mr. Mansel quotes Locke against Mr. Mill's position, to the 
effect that the supposition of an actual idea of the infinite 
realized in the mind involves a contradiction. But Mr. Mill 
does not suppose the notion to be fully realized or to be 
capable of complete realization. It is important only that the 
notion be true so far as it goes, or that it should accord with 
the facts and the evidences which the mind is capable of 
comprehending. 

We must pass over other special points of criticism, and 
hasten to the chief practical ground of difference, which we 
conceive to have furnished the real motive of Mr. Mill's 
"Examination" of Hamilton's and Mansel's doctrines. Our 
readers will remember the paragraph in the " Examination," 
p. 103: 

"If, instead of the 'glad tidings' that there exists a Being in whom 
all the excellences which the highest human mind can conceive exist in a 

* But such quantities may still be compared by their ratios when, as in the higher 
mathematics, they are "the greatest possible" under certain conditions which do not, 
however, determine or limit their values as numbers, or as definite sums of units. 

In a foot-note (p. 115), Mr. Mansel breaks a lance with Professor De Morgan, "one 
of the ablest mathematicians and the most persevering Hamiltono-mastix of the day." 
De Morgan maintains the applicability of a valid notion of infinity to mathematical mag- 
nitudes; but unfortunately assumes besides, or appears to assume, that such phrases as 
"points at an infinite distance," ''the extremities of infinite lines," etc., are literally 
valid in mathematics. This assumption Mr. Mansel easily refutes. But the main po- 
sition remains untouched. With the mathematician such phrases are really technical 
abbreviated expressions of a complex conception. Having shown validly and con- 
sistently that lines of unlimited length tend to approach continually to a given state of 
things, or to a given relation to one another, but in a manner which makes it impos- 
sible for them as lines, continuously drawn, ever to reach this state of things, the 
mathematician then changes the object of his contemplation. He dismisses the in- 
finite line, and turns his attention to the state of things (the point of tangency, for 
example) to which his infinite lines, though always approaching, could never attain. 
Instead of spanning the infinite in his thought, he simply abbreviates in his language 
that substitution of one object for another which conducts him to the end of his re 
search. 



3 5 8 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

degree inconceivable to us, I am informed that the world is ruled by a 
being whose attributes are infinite ; but what they are we cannot learn, 
nor what are the principles of his government, except that ' the highest 
human morality which we are capable of conceiving' does not sanction 
them ; convince me of it, and I will bear my fate as I may. But when I 
am told that I must believe this, and, at the same time, call this being by 
the names which express and affirm the highest human morality, I say, 
in plain terms, that I will not. Whatever power such a being may have 
over me, there is one thing which he shall not do : he shall not compel 
me to worship him. I will call no being good who is not what I mean 
when I apply that epithet to my fellow-creatures ; and if such a being 
can sentence me to hell for not so calling him, to hell I will go." 

To this Mr. Mansel replies by discussing the meaning of 
the word ''good." He asks "whether Mr. Mill really sup- 
poses the word good to lose all community of meaning when 
it is applied, as it constantly is, to different persons among our 
'fellow-creatures,' with express reference to their different du- 
ties and different qualifications for performing them ? " and he 
proposes%3 "test Mr. Mill's declamation by a parallel case": 

"A wise and experienced father addresses a young and inexperienced 
son. ' My son, ' he says, ' there may be some of my actions which do not 
seem to you to be wise or good, or such as you would do in my place. 
Remember, however, that your duties are different from mine, that your 
knowledge of my duties is very imperfect, and that there may be things 
which you cannot see to be wise and good, but which you may hereafter 
discover to be so.' 'Father,' says the son, 'your principles of action 
are not the same as mine ; the highest morality which I can conceive at 
present does not sanction them ; and as for believing that you are good 
in anything of which I do not plainly see the goodness' — We will 
not repeat Mr. Mill's alternative ; we will only ask whether it is not just 
possible that there may be as much difference between man and God as 
there is between a child and his father ?" 

This "parallel case" is, in an important respect, a very 
happy one. It suggests the real practical issue of the debate, 
unencumbered by theological and metaphysical obscurities; 
but to make it perfect, the parallel should be more exact. 
The real question is as to the child's obligation to respect his 
father's wisdom and goodness independently of any experience 
of them, and solely on the ground of that parent's word for 
them. If, from the wisdom and the goodness which the child 
has seen and understood, he infers uncomprehended higher 



M ANSEL S REPLY TO MILL. 359 

degrees of these qualities, reasoning from the known to the 
unknown, just as he does in all other relations of life, and just 
as we all do, then the child bases his faith on the sure and only 
ground of knowledge; and his deference to the father's judg- 
ment in all cases of doubt or conflict is the natural and direct 
consequence of a faith so grounded. But if, bewildered and 
oppressed by a metaphysical difficulty in trying to compre- 
hend the peculiar duties of a father, he should base his faith 
on his ignorance of them, and believe in the goodness which 
he cannot comprehend, believing because of his ignorance 
and not on account of the little knowledge he does possess : 
and if, in his blind devotion, he should abdicate his own 
intelligence, reject his own clear judgments of right, when 
they are brought into apparent conflict with the parent's self- 
ishness, or with that of servants claiming to speak by author- 
ity, then the child's devotion would not be that of an ingen- 
uous, filial piety ; it would rather be an abject slavish sub- 
mission. Such we conceive to be the really parallel case, 
involving the real practical issue between the two philosophies. 
Faith is, in one, founded on knowledge by experience ; in the 
other, it is independent of knowledge. 



LEWES'S PROBLEMS OF LIFE AND MIND.*t 

In one of the few passages of Aristotle's voluminous writ- 
ings which contain a direct reference to himself he declares 
that in his logical discoveries and inventions he had no help 
and no precursors. He says : " The syllogism as a system and 
theory, with precepts founded on that theory for demonstra- 
tion and dialectic, has originated with me. Mine is the first 
step, and therefore a small one, though worked out with much 
thought and hard labor; it must be looked at as a first step 
and judged with indulgence. You, my readers, or hearers 
of my lectures, if you think I have done as much as can 
fairly be required for an initiatory start, compared with other 
more advanced departments of theory, will acknowledge what 
I have achieved and pardon what I have left others to accom- 
plish." "In such modest terms does Aristotle speak," says 
Stuart Mill, " of what he had done for a theory which in the 
judgment even of so distant an age as the present, he did not 
as he himself says, merely commence, but completed, — so far 
as completeness can be affirmed of a scientific doctrine." 
Such unconsciousness of self as identified with a great work, 
such an estimate of the work accomplished as compared to 
what was undertaken or hoped for, is characteristic of the 
world's greatest thinkers. Newton's indifference to the world's 
estimate of what had been to him merely a diversion on the 
shores of the great unexplored ocean of truth before him, did 
not rise from an underestimate of the value of his work com- 
pared to that of his precursors, since it was not with this that 

* The latter portion of this essay was published in The Nation, June n, 1874; the 
introductory part is now first printed from the author's manuscript. 

I " Problems of Life and Mind. By George Henry Lewes. First series. The Foun- 
dations of a Creed. Vol. I." 1874. 8vo, pp. 434. 



LEWES' 'S PROBLEMS OF LLFE AND MIND. 361 

he habitually compared it. Self-assurance of ability in thought 
gained from such a comparison as a remedy to self-distrust is, 
however, apt to be eagerly sought by thinkers of an inferior 
rank. Hence, independently of any criticism of the work of 
these thinkers there is that in the mere personality of style 
which enables the world to estimate the rank of a thinker, 
and to recognize its greatest minds. If it were not for this 
quality in style wisdom could hardly be distinguished from 
orthodoxy by any but the wise themselves, that is, by the few ; 
or would be only a happy utterance of the opinions and 
expressed judgments of its admirers. 

Among the many problems, now outgrown, which engaged 
the speculation of the ancient world was one which this 
quality of wisdom thus manifested and recognized without 
being fully known, forced upon the attention of philosophers. 
Sophia was the name, perhaps for this reason, given by Aris- 
totle to the science afterwards called his metaphysics, which 
treats of the most abstract relations, and the first principles of 
the special science or philosophy separated from them though 
derived, according to him, from their foundations in experience, 
and from their special object matters. His issue with Plato 
was that Sophia is not eternal in a world of ideas, and is not 
born in the man except as a greater power of observation, 
induction, and clear thought making the most of its means 
and opportunities. Though his first philosophy was also 
called ontology, since it dealt with the relations of things 
merely as things, or with what was common to all objects 
of scientific comprehension, yet he gave no warrant for the 
meanings which the terms ontology and metaphysics after- 
wards acquired, and which they now have in relation to 
sources of knowledge, supposed to be distinct from proper 
scientific evidences. These terms have become so far identi- 
fied with the doctrine of transcendentalism, the modern form 
of Platonism, that is, with supposed or supra-sensible grounds 
of valid belief, that they have been discarded by many modern 
thinkers as tending from their acquired meanings to associate in 
the mind falsely the objects of legitimate speculation in the most 
abstruse problems with that solution of them which is by no- 
16 



3 62 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



means accepted or acceptable to the clearest thinkers. Comte 
not only rejected these terms with others like Cause and Sub- 
stance, from philosophy, because they had come to connote a 
false doctrine, but because, as he thought, they were hopelessly 
tainted with a disposition of the mind in the use of language 
to attach the notion of reality, or of being like a thing, to 
every familiar abstraction, and especially to such as show 
a marked contrast in their apparent simplicity in the famil- 
iar though merely symbolic employment of them with their 
really complex and ill-understood signification. As in the 
crudest forms of speculative imagination things and efficient 
causes are personified, or, more properly, are undistinguished 
from the more familiar natures of persons and volitions, so 
Comte regarded the tendency to "realize abstractions," or to 
consider them divided, just as things are divided, as a crude 
mode of thought relative to the positive stage which some 
modern sciences have entered. And to hasten the progress 
of the scientific mode of thought he proposed to discard certain 
terms, or to substitute others for them less liable to this in- 
fection. 

Aristotle was not fully aware of this source of error, though 
he knew well enough what transcendentalism means. He 
rejected the latter error as a doctrine of evidence, though he 
was not free from the tendency to realize abstractions. Mr. 
Lewes, though for so many years a student and expounder 
of Comte, is much nearer to Aristotle than to his modern 
master in this respect. 

It must not be supposed, however, that this confusion of 
differences in the abstract with concrete divisions in our 
knowledge is one purposely committed by any modern thinker 
of note, or is done consciously and formally as it was by some 
of the realist schoolmen. Nevertheless the tendency is so 
strong in all who are not empiricists by practice as well as in 
doctrine, that writers in whom we should a priori least expect 
it still give most marked indications of the tendency. It is a 
vice more common with the disciples and commentators of 
philosophy than with great original thinkers. It is what 
naturally happens when we become familiar with a name and 



LEWES' S PROBLEMS OF LIFE AND MIND. 363 

-with fragments, as it were, of its meaning, long before the 
whole signification is set before us, or where there is no 
definite connotation,but rather a very vague and complex one, 
in the name itself, as in the words civilization, gentleman, or 
honor, which correspond to different notions, or complex sets 
of notions, in different minds according to the scope of their 
-experience. Investigators in modern science not especially 
distinguished for philosophical acumen yet often have the skill 
to exert toward the objects of their pursuit the logical function 
of giving valid names, or tying things together in new bundles. 
This skill, so far as it goes, gives to the scientific empiricist in 
practice a power which is shown in the higher philosophy only 
by the most original thinkers. Every student of science is 
thus within his own province of practical empiricism a pos- 
itivist : though beyond this province he may be a believer in 
a priori or transcendental evidence, and will almost certainly 
be more or less of a realist unconsciously, if not avowedly.* 
Realism as a vice of thought, and transcendentalism as a 
doctrine of evidence, things very distinct in meaning, are 
closely allied in fact. 

A distinction in existing terms is called an abstract one, and 
is often called, with a certain degree of propriety, a meta- 
physical distinction when it is considered in itself, and, though 
clearly defined, is not considered with reference to its classi- 
ficatory value, or in reference to its coincidence with other 
distinctions which together with it serve to mark out concrete 
objects or distinguish them as real classes or kinds. 

The classifications of natural history and chemistry afford 
more valuable principles of criticism on metaphysical systems 

* He may even be such with respect to the more abstruse portions of his own science 
or to portions in which he is a learner or disciple rather than an investigator. The dis- 
position to give a unity in thought to the meaning of a single name whose connotation 
is not fully known or is a vague and complex set of attributes or relations, is an always 
present temptation to speculate a priori or on transcendental grounds of naming : or to 
suppose that the empirical attributes connoted by the name are collected around a cen- 
tral and essential, but transcendental, condition of their co-existence, that brings them all 
together. The metaphysical effort is to "seize " upon this condition ; but the definite- 
ness in thought thus gained is rather in the emphasis of the seizure than in the palpable 
nature of its object, and the metaphysical grasp, though often vigorous, is too often 
empty. Aristotle was, for instance, in Logic a positivist, and was opposed to transcend- 
entalism in philosophy, though not free, as we have said, from realism. 



364 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

than any doctrines of method among metaphysicians them- 
selves, either ancLnt or modern. This modern addition to prin- 
ciples of method in philosophy is of the very greatest value. Ev- 
ery naturalist is now familiar with the fact that empirical choice 
is necessarily made between characters and distinctions with 
reference to their value in classification. A division of ani- 
mals into aqueous and terrestrial, for instance, or into air- 
breathing and water-breathing, is not faulty merely because 
there are amphibious animals. Indeed, in a restricted sense, 
when it refers to the co-existence of lungs and gills the term 
amphibious is a more useful one in natural history than any 
terms referring simply to the animal's external relations. Such 
terms of distinction are not found to coincide with the nu- 
merous other and less conspicuous distinctions which together 
determine real kinds. A division of animals into vertebrates 
and invertebrates, or into warm-blooded and cold-blooded, 
is much more fundamental, and valuable in discriminating 
real kinds, yet no metaphysical insight ever excogitated this 
value in it. The absence of any canon of method in meta- 
physics for discovering the relative values of its numerous 
distinctions is the one great vice of its systems, and is a more 
characteristic mark than either the doctrine of transcendental- 
ism in any of its forms, or the tendency to vagueness and the 
confusion of distinctions in abstractions with differences in 
things. These are indeed consequences of the fatal want of 
method in all ancient philosophy, and in the modern so far as 
it is a lineal descendant from the ancient. Though many 
modern writers like Mr. Herbert Spencer, M. Taine (on In- 
telligence) and Mr. Lewes condemn transcendentalism, their 
works are very properly regarded as metaphysical since they 
continue to pursue abstractions with as little reference to their 
empirically determined value in classification as ever the an- 
cients did. Analogical generalization rather than transcend- 
entalism is the characteristic method of the system-building 
modern English school of metaphysics.* The history of such 

* While a naturalist or a chemist would be ready in conformity to widening knowledge 
of facts to remodel or revolutionize his divisions or even his nomenclature, metaphysical 
systems aim at the same end by allowing unlimited expansions to the meanings of terms. 
Vagueness in them is even claimed as a merit when it is perceived. 



LEWES' 'S PROBLEMS OF LIFE AXD MIND. 365 

terms as "matter and form," as, from Aristotle downwards, 
they gradually came to be applied more and more widely or 
with vaguer and vaguer meanings until they ceased to have 
any meaning at all in their universal application, except that 
the one meant all the other did not mean : the endless dis- 
putes as to how studies should be arranged in the assumed 
division into arts and sciences ; as to whether, for example, 
Logic was a science or an art ; such cases illustrate the essen- 
tial character of metaphysical speculation. 

Mr. Lewes has, in overlooking this fact, illustrated it anew. 
Dissenting from Comte's opinion that the term metaphysics is 
no longer of any use. and may be discarded along with the 
names of several allied subjects, and with terms that have a 
metaphysical taint and for which better terms may be sub- 
stituted : holding, on the contrary, that the latter have valid 
meanings in experiential or positive philosophy, and that not 
only logic and psychology, but even metaphysics deserve 
a distinct place in the classification of the sciences, he discards 
important features of Comtism by making in metaphysics 
a metaphysical distinction. He divides it into valid meta- 
physics, amenable to the methods of science, and a branch 
which he calls metempirics. As a move in the tactics of 
philosophical debate this invention might be good. Modern 
transcendentalism has given formal assent to the validity and 
importance of modern principles of scientific method, as it had 
before to various precepts in philosophical method; but for 
itself it openly repudiates allegiance to the special methods 
of scientific research, and takes refuge from criticism in as- 
sumed a priori grounds of knowledge, under the guidance 
of Kant. It has gone, it supposes, beyond the jurisdiction 
of the principles of method to which science is subjected. 
What has it to do with the rules and instruments of induction 
if its evidence is not inductive ? To dislodge metaphysics 
from this fortress by effecting a diversion and a division of its 
forces ; to claim for science all the rational problems of meta- 
physics ; to claim the name metaphysics for the rational solu- 
tions of them in which numbers can agree, and, for this 
purpose, to invent a name happily (or unhappily) adapted to 



366 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

bear the odium of all the follies and errors for which meta- 
physics has been condemned ; namely, the word metempirics — 
ill-fated at birth — such appears to be our author's purpose. 
But in this he has assumed that metaphysics is characterized 
by the doctrine of transcendentalism; that it is the doctrine 
of innate ideas. 

It would be difficult, if not impossible, to assign to the name 
metaphysics its meaning in modern usage, or to distinguish it 
from general philosophy and the abstruser parts of the sciences 
by proper definition; and especially, so far as its method is 
concerned, to distinguish it from the precepts of method com- 
mon to all well-conducted speculations. A lack of method, or 
of many well-grounded canons of research and criticism, ap- 
pears to be all that truly characterizes it, independently of an 
enumeration of the special topics and doctrines to which the 
name is usually given. Its method at any particular epoch in 
the history of philosophy appears to have been little else than 
the application of some principal doctrine in it to subsidiary 
topics, the defense of which against sceptical criticisms, or 
against other principles of method, has generally been the 
most distinctive part it has played in the history of philosophy. 
What is called the "method" of metaphysics is really an essen- 
tia] part of it, considered as a scientific doctrine. For exam- 
ple, the realism of Plato, and the forms of the doctrine held by 
the Scotist and Thomist schoolmen; Plato's doctrine, that all 
real knowledge is a kind of reminiscence, with the modern 
doctrines of innate, transcendental, a priori, or intuitive ele- 
ments in knowledge; Descartes's egoistic basis of philosophical 
demonstration, and the more recent developments of idealism, 
are at once parts of metaphysics and principles of method in 
its procedures. On the other hand, Plato's contributions to 
the principles of method, in his doctrine of definition and his 
examples of dialectic art; Aristotle's objections to Plato's real- 
ism, which were the foundations of scholastic nominalism, and 
the ontological or universal axioms on which Aristotle based 
his theory and precepts of syllogism; his defense of induction 
as the basis of axioms and the ultimate ground of all truths; 
and the various precepts of philosophical procedure proposed 



LEWES' S PROBLEMS OF LLFE AND MIND. 367 

by • Oescartes, Bacon, Leibnitz, and by Locke, Newton, and 
the* : modern followers, all belong to the general doctrine of 
method, which, so far from being peculiar to what is now 
called metaphysics, is really more characteristic of the modern 
sciences and of the Positive philosophy. 

That vague and ill-defined body of doctrine which is none 
the less distinctly felt by all modern students of philosophy to 
be in a sort of antagonism to the spirit of the modern sciences 
and to the Positive philosophy, cannot, therefore, be clearly 
distinguished by a marked difference of method. Its distinc- 
tion is really, more fundamental, and relates to original motives 
rather than to differences of method 'in research. Yet it is true 
that this distinction of motives affects method very materially 
and results in marked differences in modes of thought. Mod- 
ern metaphysics disregards many points of method deemed es- 
sential in the Positive philosophy, not because it is ignorant of 
them, but because they are seen or felt to be opposed to the 
vital interests of the main purposes for which metaphysics is 
studied. When schools of philosophy differ, as they do in the 
fundamental division of them, in respect to the motives of their 
questionings or the purposes of their researches, their differ- 
ences can be rationally accounted for only by recognizing their 
origins in differences of character in philosophers. Though it 
may not be strictly true that men are born either .Platonists or 
Aristotelians, it is certain that those who take the most active 
Dart in the philosophical discussions of their day have enlisted 
early in. life in one or the other of the two great schools, inspired 
predominately by one or the other of two distinct sets of phil- 
osophical motives, which we may characterize briefly as 
motives of defense in questioned sentiments, and motives of 
scientific or utilitarian inquisitiveness. The points of method 
or doctrine which suit either attitude of mind are those it 
adopts and pursues; and in modern times the notion has come 
in vogue, and received the sanction of metaphysics, that there 
are really two independent methods of equal generality, and 
applicable to two distinct departments of human thought. 

It would be futile to classify systems of thought by this dis- 
tinction in motives, since both sets of motives come into play 



368 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

in every thinker whose doctrines are historical, or the out- 
growth of the mutual criticisms of contending sects in the past. 
Thinkers not uncommonly hold and even advocate, as Mr. 
Lewes has done, as a Positivist, for many years (in writings 
which therefore appear in marked contrast to his present work), 
doctrines derived from the school opposed to that in which 
they had become really enlisted, either by native character or 
early influences. This attitude having also the appearance of 
a judicial one, or manifesting a disposition to find the truth 
between extreme views, is often consciously assumed, though 
thinkers arrive at it from opposite positions, and unconsciously 
bring to it opposite motives of research. These motives would 
determine, therefore, grounds of division between thinkers who 
really differ less in fundamental positions, either of doctrine or 
method, than in modes of thought. 

Mr. Lewes, in his plea for the higher speculative studies, is 
so far a metaphysician, or so far retains the effects, in his mode 
of thought, of the early influences of the Scottish school, that he 
fails to distinguish the special causes or exigencies of meta- 
physics from what he generously calls its "method"; though he 
qualifies it as "irrational." His account of this "method" is 
extremely vague. Comte had identified the doctrines of meta- 
physics with the once leading dogmas of realism; the assimila- 
tion of abstractions to things , or to self-existent and permanent 
beings, either material or spiritual, being the common point of de- 
parture in these scholastic speculations. But he did so because 
he believed these dogmas to take their rise from an erroneous but 
natural tendency of the mind in its earliest use of abstract 
terms and meanings, or from a vice of language, to which the 
mind is always prone, and against which the positive or scien- 
tific modes of thought and criticism are the only safeguards. 
With this understanding of the term he rejected metaphysics, 
both name and thing, from his system of rational studies; and 
with metaphysics he also condemned the allied studies of logic 
and psychology, choosing to connect what he valued in them 
with the general science of method, and with that of sociology. 
The English followers of Comte did not accept the latter reforms- 
of positivism. Logic and psychology still hold their place in En- 



LE IVES'S PROBLEMS OF LIFE AND MIND. 



369 



glish thought, though the decline of strictly logical studies (which 
began long before Comte) had made itself distinctly felt in the 
deterioration of British philosophy, and is still very noticeable,' 
notwithstanding the wide and beneficial effect of the publica- 
tion of Mill's "Logic" thirty years ago. The rehabilitation of 
metaphysics, both name and thing, now proposed by Mr. 
Lewes, appears to him a step in the same direction. He 
wishes to restore what is valuable and rational in the doctrines 
and problems of metaphysics to the rank of a distinct science, 
to which he would give its ancient and honored name. 

But, to do this in the interests of true science, it is necessary 
to exclude from metaphysics the doctrines and problems which 
are due to its "irrational method"; and he separates these, at 
least in name, by calling them "metempirics." All that we 
have to do, he says, is to exclude from the problems of meta- 
physics the metempirical elements, the questions which in their 
very form demand more knowledge than experience can fur- 
nish — all questions of transcendental origins and conditions — 
in short, all arbitrary questionings, to which gratuitous assump- 
tions only can be given in answer, and we have left principles 
and problems that may be properly collected and studied un- 
der the name "metaphysics." To these he gives the taking 
title of " Problems of Life and Mind," a title which tacitly ap- 
peals to both of the two sets of motives, scientific inquisitive- 
ness and the sentimental interests, which have hitherto divided 
the speculative world. 

" Speculative minds cannot," he says, "resist the fascination of meta- 
physics, even when forced to admit that its inquiries are hopeless. This 
fact must be taken into account, since it makes refutation powerless. 
Indeed, one may say, generally, that no deeply-rooted tendency was ever 
extirpated by adverse argument. . . . Contempt, ridicule, argument 
are all in vain against tendencies toward metaphysical speculation. There 
is but one effective mode of displacing an error, and that is to replace it by 
a conception which, while readily adjusting itself to conceptions firmly 
held on other points, is seen to explain the facts more completely." 

We entirely agree with Mr. Lewes that it is idle to argue 
against " tendencies," even tendencies to error; for this would 
be to argue against human nature itself. It is to specific errors 
that we ought to address our arguments; and we ought, by di- 



370 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

viding the tendencies — the erroneous or misdirected from the 
true, to expose the false ones in their consequences, and thus 
conquer them. The true and false, or the well and ill directed, 
are naturally mixed in the speculative tendencies of the mind. 
To condemn all that has been or is now called metaphysics 
would, therefore, be on the face of it a rash procedure. But to 
invent a new name merely as a name for the errors or the 
misdirections in speculation which are involved in its questions, 
and for the sake only of retaining metaphysics as the name of 
scientific principles and problems that have been or may here- 
after be included in the higher philosophy, is too much in ac- 
cordance with older metaphysical principles of nomenclature ; 
or, rather, is too much like the older and crude practice of met- 
aphysicians, to be cordially received as a scientific reform. 
Botanists, zoologists, and chemists have made it evident that a 
distinction, however clearly defined, is not of value in classifi- 
cation unless it is something more than a distinction. It must 
coincide with and be of use as a sign of other distinctions — 
that is, be a mark of the things distinguished by it, in order to 
have real value in classification. 

Mr. Lewes is so far from recognizing, in the rules of philoso- 
phizing followed by him, this important modern addition to 
scientific method, the disregard of which is a chief cause of fu- 
tile hair-splittings and aberrations, both in science and meta- 
physics, that he shows in many parts of his book a noticeable 
lack of familiarity with it. We do not believe that metempirics 
will ever become a scientific name, and we are quite sure it 
will not be acceptable to metaphysicians. As a literary inven- 
tion it is not without merits; and, indeed, the literary merits of 
the whole book are by far its greatest. " Metempiric " is a 
good retort to the reproach of the term "empiric," and, as a 
ruse de guerre, not a bad device for dividing the enemy's forces. 
Divide ctimpera is good strategy; and there is practically much 
satisfaction in a name. It is upon the associations involved in 
the term "metaphysics" that the larger division of modern 
speculative thinkers mainly subsist. To deprive them of their 
name would, if practicable, take away the apparent defensible- 
ness of their last positions, namely, that their "method" is pecu- 



LEWES' S PROBLEMS OF LIFE AND MIND. 37 r 

Har to their problems; and that the doctrines they maintain, or 
defend, are safely intrenched in the transcendental mystery of 
the mind's birth, and are exempt from scientific criticism. 
"Experience," however, has also come to be a name so much 
respected that these thinkers, anticipating the movements which 
would appropriate their title to respectability, have already for 
some time made a counter movement, and come to hold 
that the evidence they contend for as ultimate still lies 
within the province of experience, or is not known beforehand, 
at least in actual consciousness; and to hold that it is not 
gathered from any but the sources of particular experiences ; 
but that intuitive universal truths are, nevertheless, not general- 
izations of experience, and are not even to be tested and ulti- 
mately evinced as such. Induction is allowed only a limited 
range. Intuition is held to be another and an independent 
form of experience. This adoption of the word " experience " 
is in accordance with the time-honored practice in metaphys- 
ics of annexing troublesome neighbors, giving a vague and 
metaphysical expansion to the meanings of hostile words, and 
thus destroying their critical powers. 

The sense in which induction was used by Aristotle and by 
the best of England's thinkers in the past, as the basis both of 
the intuitive and the discursive operations of thought, or as be- 
ing involved in sensible perception and in reflective intuitions, 
or in rapid, habitual, and instinctive judgments generally, quite 
as essentially as in formal and consciously guarded or tested 
generalizations, is the sense in which these metaphysical think- 
ers reject induction as the real basis of all truths; and Mr. 
Lewes, as well as Mr. Spencer, M. Taine, and other late 
eclectics, weakly and confusedly go along with them — con- 
fusedly, on account of the present great deterioration of phil- 
osophical language in reference to the questions common to 
the present time and the old logicians, which the latter treated 
with a precision of philosophical language unfortunately want- 
ing in the conceptulastic terms and phraseology of the present 
day. We have grounds of hope, however, that the present 
phase of vague speculation will soon pass away, and that a 
generation of thinkers will succeed, trained in so much of the 



37 2 



PHIL OSOPHICA L DISC US S IONS. 



refined and effective terminology and mode of thought of the 
nominalist logicians as Mill's "Logic" has rescued from ob- 
livion; thinkers who will be able to understand without con- 
fusion the nature of axioms. 

The fact that axioms are capable of clear, distinct, and ade- 
quate statement in language, and are not consciously based on 
remembered or recorded particulars of experience, but are in- 
tuitive, or habitual and rapid, interpretations of valid meanings 
in terms; the fact that an axiom may at first be merely one 
among a thousand early and spontaneous generalizations of 
the mind; that of these the great majority are overthrown by 
subsequent experience, while the one which becomes an axiom, 
meeting with no counter experience, but, coinciding with all 
subsequent experience, survives, is strengthened, and becomes 
habitual; that it becomes so elementary and so fundamental a 
habit that no other habit or power of thought can oppose it; 
that it has thus determined our powers of conception as Well 
as our beliefs through experience — these facts are in strict ac- 
cordance with the Aristotelian doctrine that axioms are based 
upon inductions, although they are not the results of a formal 
and consciously guarded procedure in accordance with the 
canons of inductive logic. In their primary signification and 
in this connection the terms "induction" and "inductive" refer 
directly to evidences, and not to any special means and proc- 
esses of collating and interpreting them. Writers of the sort 
we have characterized continually confound these two mean- 
ings. So, also, they confound the meanings, one valid and 
the other not so, in the terms " intuition " and "intuitive." Mr. 
Lewes, after having distinctly contrasted (pp. 342-348) intui- 
tive and discursive judgments, and characterized the former as 
rapid or habitual inferences, adds shortly afterwards (p. 356) 
that he does " not wish to be understood as adopting the view 
that axioms are founded on induction; on the contrary," he 
says, "I hold them to be founded on intuition. They are 
founded on experience, because intuition is empirical." 

Intuition in its proper meaning of rapid, instinctive judgment, 
whether in the objective sensible perception of relatively con- 
crete matters, or in the most abstract, differs equally from in- 



LEWES'S PROBLEMS OF LIFE AND MIND. 7,12, 

ductive and deductive processes of conscious inference. But 
there is no contrast or alternative between intuition and induc- 
tion in reference to ultimate grounds of belief, except in 
the spurious metaphysical meaning of "intuition"; which 
Mr. Lewes has, it therefore appears, confusedly adopted, while 
seeming to hold his former positions as a positivist. Induction 
in one of its meanings, as a process of conscious generalization, 
and intuition, as another form of judgment, are only contrasted 
as judgments y the one consciously and the other unconsciously 
determined, on the occasion of making the judgment, by past 
particulars of experience. If Mr. Lewes had been a purist in 
philosophy he might, perhaps, escape from this objection, on 
the ground that what is meant by the phrase, "grounds of a 
belief," is not the unconscious but the concious causes of it; the 
facts or reasons from which we infer it. What is properly meant, 
however, by affirming particulars of experience to be the ground 
of belief in axioms, is not that these particulars are present indi- 
vidually in memory on every occasion of making such a judg- 
ment; but only that they are the proper tests of validity in an ul- 
timate philosophical examination of axiomatic truths; and are, as 
they occur, the actual and conscious causes of the judgments, 
and of their growing certitude, and of the growing precision of 
meaning in the terms by which they are expressed ; though in- 
dividually they are not retained or recalled in memory. 

So far, however, are our author's statements from being en- 
titled to careful consideration on the ground of precision in the 
use of philosophical terms, that by far the greater part of what 
we should have to say about his book, if we had space to say 
it, would relate to obscurities growing out of his inattention to 
ambiguities and vagueness in philosophical language. Thus, 
he follows a bad late use of the term a priori ; which properly, 
and in Kant, means a logical ground or cause of knowledge; 
and he applies the term to inherited, organized, or instinct- 
ive tendencies to the association of particulars in experience, 
or to "aptitudes for thought"; to which Kant properly refuses 
the name a priori (p. 410). Again, from not seeing an am- 
biguity in the word knowledge, he discovers (p. 405 ) what ap- 
pears to him a contradiction in Kant's doctrine; which -seems 



374 



PHIL OSOPHICA L DISCUSSIONS. 



to assert that "all knowledge begins with experience" a pos- 
teriori^ and yet asserts that "some knowledge is anteced- 
ent to and independent of experience." Our author surely 
cannot have failed to meet in his extensive studies with the 
distinction in metaphysics between the commencement or in- 
troduction, and the source ( exordium et origo ), of knowledge ; 
as well as the distinction of actual or present knowledge and 
that which w r e are said to possess in memory, although we are 
not at the time thinking of it. Yet he seems to have forgotten 
these distinctions. All that Kant maintains is that a knowl- 
edge like that of memory, a knowledge in posse, of which, as 
he thinks, experience cannot be the source, is involved, and 
may be recognized, in the actual judgments of experience; but 
is not recognized before experience; or except as a form given 
to the matter of experience — a doctrine vague enough, we ad- 
mit, in meaning, and doubtless gratuitous in fact, but not self- 
contradictory. In short, Mr. Lewes's book is full of illus- 
trations of the importance of improving metaphysics, not as a 
positive science, but as a dialectic art; an art allied both to 
logic and to lexicography. There are, indeed, such treatises in 
existence, which are much less interesting than Mr. Lewes's 
book. Such treatises are generally, and ought to be, as dry as 
a dictionary, but do not the less deserve attention, as correct- 
ives of the current loose thinking on the most abstract subjects. 



McCOSH ON TYNDALL* 

Among the natural consequences of the sin committed by 
Professor Tyndall in the hardihood of his late Belfast address, 
is the revival by it of the inextinguishable flame of metaphysic- 
al controversy. That the address was not fit, in the nature of 
things — to say nothing of the conventions, the common or un- 
written laws of scientific societies, which the author violated — 
appears by the consequence that the most fitting reply to it 
comes from Dr. McCosh.f Such popular organizations as the 
British Association for the Advancement of Science were copied 
from the aims and disciplines of the elite among modern scien- 
tific societies. These societies are, in a word, schools of Ba- 
con ism, designed to embody all that was of value in the 
thought and spirit of Bacon — namely, a protest against tradi- 
tional authority in science, with, of course, a recommendation 
of induction and of the inductive sciences for their value in the 
arts of life. As to method in induction, Bacon's teaching was 
of comparatively little value. His really distinguishing service 
was in accomplishing a more or less complete and enduring 
severance, at least in British thought, of physical science from 
scholastic philosophy, and from all traditions of more ancient 
thought. One of the most interesting consequences of this 
movement is that the word " philosophy," and even the name 
"natural philosophy," have distinctly different meanings in En- 
glish and in the continental languages. The body of ancient 
traditional thought was so completely routed that its name, 

* From The Nation, April 22, 1875. 

t "Ideas in Nature overlooked by Dr. Tyndall: being an Examination of Dr. Tyndall's 
Belfast Address. By James McCosh, D. D., LL. D." 1875. 

" The Scottish Philosophy, Biographical, Expository, Critical, from Hutcheson to 
Hamilton. By James McCosh, LL.D., D. D. " 1875. 



376 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

Philosophy, lost its meaning, and became appropriated to the 
knowledge and pursuits which in ancient times divine philos- 
ophy disdained. Socrates, it is said, brought down philosophy 
from the clouds; and Continental thinkers have reproached 
the English for having degraded her to the kitchen. This rec- 
ognition of the dignity of the useful and of the authority of 
induction, but still more the subtler perceptions of method in 
induction by later English thinkers, and especially in the Posi- 
tivism of Locke, Newton, Herschel, and J. S. Mill, have more 
than anything else given the English their eminence in modern 
science. The restraints of the speculative spirit in scientific 
pursuits, determined mainly by a desire for peace with Theol- 
ogy and Philosophy, and accomplished by a division of prov- 
inces, have been the chief cause of the easy triumphs of induct- 
ive evidences in the modern sciences of physics, astronomy, 
chemistry, and even geology and biology, over an opposition 
which, when roused, has carried with it the strength of a desper- 
ate self-defense and all the gigantic forces of tradition. The best 
British thinkers, therefore, from Newton to Darwin, have re- 
spected this peace ; and Dr. Tyndall has put himself out of 
this category by the performance that relegates him to the ten- 
der mercies of Dr. McCosh. 

As spectators of the combat, we may, however, forget the 
rash occasion which brought our scientific hero into this arena, 
and extend a sympathy to him in this relation which we with- 
held from him as the retiring president of the British Associa- 
tion. In the prefaces to his published address, Tyndall charges 
some of his critics with " a spirit of bitterness which desires, 
with a fervor inexpressible in words, my eternal ill." Dr. Mc- 
Cosh " happens to know of some of them, that they are pray- 
ing for him, in all humility and tenderness, that he and all oth- 
ers who have come under his influence may be kept from all 
evil, temporal and eternal." Such belligerent magnanimity 
must be very consoling to its object. To be prayed for partic- 
ularly by fellow-mortals that we may be delivered from delib- 
erately cherished, or at least seriously considered, views on the 
nature of things, and not alone for what we ourselves recognize 
as evils, may be from a sympathy with a supposed unconscious, 



McCOSII ON TYNDALL. 



377 



undeveloped better-self in us; but to us, our conscious selves, 
it seems scarcely different, except in degree, from a sympathy 
and a wish for our eternal welfare which would burn us at the 
stake. Indeed, the attitude is not very unlike that of picking 
up the fagots for a spiritual cremation, of which the material 
symbol is now forbidden by civilized opinion and law. To 
use the language of kindliness and magnanimity when every 
page manifests an intense, though smothered, odium theolo- 
gicum,- conceals nothing, and repels more effectively than the 
most open hostility. Expressions of petty spite, depreciatory 
epithets, intimations of ill-opinion, readiness to credit evil re- 
ports of those who hold unorthodox opinions in philosophy, 
and misinterpretations of every sign of weakness in them — 
these characterize Dr. McCosh's treatment of those thinkers, 
included in his latest published biographies of Scottish philoso- 
phers, who differ from him in fundamental views. If his ob- 
ject — supposing him to have an object in this — were simply 
to frighten the faithful from any contact with the unholy, we 
can see how he might effectively keep them faithful through 
ignorance; but if he thinks in this way to win any one to his 
standard, we think he greatly mistakes the nature of the sceptic. 
He calls attention in his preface to the fact "that in this paper, 
under none of its forms, have I charged Professor Tyndall with 
being an atheist"; and near the close of his paper he an- 
nounces that " I make no inquiry into the personal beliefs of Dr. 
Tyndall," though in the preface he had professed to believe 
that Tyndall's feelings are not fixedly bad : " At present very 
wavering and uncertain— -feelings, rather than convictions found- 
ed on evidence." Dr. McCosh here makes use of the " extenuat- 
ing method," the eiro?ieia of Aristotle's rhetoric, though with 
ineffective art. His restraint from this fearful accusation is 
made up for by a zeal going greatly beyond due accuracy 
of thought and exposition, in his preparation of the case for 
whosoever may thereby be stimulated to prefer the charge. 

We have space only for the examination of one great con- 
fusion of thought which runs through not only this paper but 
much of the criticism in his biographical work on the "Scottish 
Philosophy," wherever he treats of the opinions of the "scep- 
tics " of his native land. 



378 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

Lord Bacon is Dr. McCosh's model in philosophizing,- and, 
however marked may be the differences, there is a striking sim- 
ilarity between their minds. The great point of sympathy is in 
Bacon's demonstrative, aggressive, and rather effasive profes- 
sions of theism. This wins for Bacon the enthusiasm of such 
a disciple for "the comprehensiveness of his mighty mind"; 
and is likewise the measure with Dr. McCosh of the minds 
which he treats favorably in his biographies. Now, Bacon in 
his model inquiry which occupies so large a space in the 
''Novum Organum," — the inquiry into the form of heat,— 
reaches the conclusion that heat is a kind of motion ; meaning, 
of course, not the feeling of heat, but the conditions of the 
feeling. Dr. McCosh would be the last to charge Bacon with 
atheism for this verbal ellipsis. Nor do we suppose that he 
would be alarmed by the confusing ambiguities of the words 
light, sound, taste, touch, and the like, which are used by all 
modern philosophers to express two totally dissimilar natures, 
the tremors of ether and air, with the chemical and mechanical 
properties of bodies in contact with special organs of sense, 
and the sensations of light, sound, etc., of which these hom- 
onymical words are also the names; a part of the cause and 
its effect having the same names though wholly different in 
nature. Nor again do we suppose that he would take alarm 
at the inclusion, in such names, of the other physical conditions 
of a conscious product or sensation — namely, the movements 
or changes in living nervous tissues, which are the more imme- 
diate conditions of the production of a sensation. Mr. J. S. 
Mill, however, in his " Logic," takes to task a philosopher of his 
own school for defining an idea or notion as "a contraction, 
motion, or configuration of the fibres which constitute the im- 
mediate organ of sense." "Our notions" Mill exclaims, "a 
configuration of fibres! What kind of philosopher must he be 
who thinks that a phenomenon is defined to be the conditions 
on which he supposes it to depend?" What sort of philoso- 
pher must this one be, we may add, who not only makes this 
confusion in his imputations of opinion to scientific philoso- 
phers, ancient and modern, but intimates that the gravest de- 
fects not only of mind but of character are implied by it ? 



McCOSH ON TYNDALL. 379 

The poverty of philosophical language, rather than such fatuity, 
would have been the more charitable account of what is 
charged as materialism against these thinkers. No philoso- 
pher of note among them, we are sure, ever seriously thought 
that atoms by their collocations and movements explain ( in 
the sense of unfolding the essential natures of) "sensation, 
judgment, reason; of love, passion, resolution." None ever 
attempted, as Dr. McCosh intimates that Tyndall has done, 
to " account in this way for the affection of a mother for her 
son, of a patriot for his country, of a Christian for his Saviour." 
No one ever supposed that, "aggregate them [the atoms] as 
you choose, and let them dance as they will," there is " any 
power in them to generate [in the sense of producing their like] 
the fancies of Shakespeare — his Hamlet, his Lady Macbeth, his 
King Lear — the sublimities of Milton, the penetration of New- 
ton, or the moral grandeur of the death of Socrates." Yet Dr. 
McCosh calls Tyndall to account for so doing in these grave 
terms: "What — to employ the very mildest form of rebuke — 
can be the use of devising hypotheses which have not even the 
semblance of explaining the phenomena? In the interest of 
science, not to speak of religion, it is of moment at this present 
time to lay an arrest on such rash speculations; and to insist 
on the scientific men refraining from what Bacon denounces 
as 'anticipations of nature,' and confining themselves to facts 
and the co-ordination of facts." 

Dr. McCosh is not quite accurate here about what his model 
Bacon recommends. The past errors which Bacon opposed 
he called " the Anticipations of Nature " by the mind, and in 
place of this recommended " the Interpretation of Nature," or 
"that which is properly deduced from things," and (it is to be 
presumed) may include somewhat more than a bare co-ordina- 
tion of facts. But whatever Bacon meant to " denounce," it is 
certain that the physical sciences which have grown up since 
his time involved in their establishment a great deal more of 
"the picturing power of the mind," which Tyndall justly es- 
teems, than Dr. McCosh is inclined to allow. But this is a 
comparatively trivial error. The gravamen of his charge is 
wholly mistaken. Tyndall publishes as an appendix to his ad- 



380 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

dress a lecture previously delivered, in which the doctrine thus 
imputed to him is disavowed. Dr. McCosh refers to this fact, 
but regards it as either trivial or as inconsistent with the omi- 
nous meaning of that discovery in matter of " the promise and 
potency of every quality of life" for the "confession" of which 
Tyndall " abandons all disguise." In spite of this lecture Dr. 
McCosh thinks that Tyndall "feels himself entitled to hold 
that matter, though we cannot say how, may give us all the op- 
erations of understanding and will." It is important to un- 
derstand here in what sense " may give us " is to be taken. Cer- 
tainly Tyndall is no disciple of Lucretius, or of the great and sub- 
tle Greek physicists, if he holds that atoms, the primordia, the el- 
ements, the seeds, or first-beginnings of things have the natures 
of understanding and will. That these are not the properties, 
but only the accidents (in the logical sense), of the movements 
and collocations of the elements, is the Lucretian doctrine. 
Moreover, " primordial elements " does not refer to remoteness 
in time past, but to simplicity and unchangeableness in present, 
past, future, or the infinitely enduring causes of change. In other 
words, what these philosophers sought to explain by their theory 
of atoms is not the natures of the passing, phenomena of sense, 
understanding, and will, but their occurrences, and the order 
(such as there is) in their occurrences as actualities or events. 
Such phenomena were not regarded as consisting of the proper- 
ties of atoms, of size, weight, movement; but only as depending 
for their actual manifestation on certain elemental collocations 
and movements. Modern physiology is in striking accordance 
with these vague speculations. It does not, neither did they, 
affirm that the properties of matter (that is, the permanent and 
universal natures of matter) define or determine anything ex- 
cept the events of phenomena. Neither were the gods exclud- 
ed by these speculations from existence, or from the moral 
interests and regards of men, in accordance with their reputed 
characters. They were only excluded from the arbitrary de- 
termination of the course of events, or from any other inter- 
ference than that of being in their consciousness and actions 
a part of this course. They, too, were dependent in their 
thoughts and volitions on material conditions. Whatever loss 



McCOSH ON TYNDALL. 381 

•of dignity or wound to pride in men might come from such 
subjection to material conditions was shared, according to this 
philosophy, by the gods. That the conditions of the nervous 
tissues which we vaguely describe as health, wakefulness, and 
vigor are a sum of material conditions, which occurring along 
with other material conditions around them determine partic- 
ular perceptions, thoughts, and volitions as mental events, is a 
modern form of the same doctrine. This does not involve, 
■however, the kind of explanation that Dr. McCosh appears 
to suppose. 

There are two meanings of the word " explanation," or, rath- 
er, two kinds of explanation involved in philosophy, the con- 
founding of which, not by Dr. McCosh alone, but by nearly 
all the hostile critics of ancient and modern physical philosophy, 
has led to great confusion and injustice. To know the condi- 
tions of the occurrence of anything in such sort that we may 
predict this occurrence, whenever and wherever these conditions 
are given, though as phenomena these conditions may be in 
their natures wholly unlike the effects of them, is one mode of 
explanation. To presume this mode to be applicable to rela- 
tions of any nature in which the conditions and phenomena are 
too complicated to be fully known or used for prediction, is to 
make speculative employment of it. To be able to analyze 
or decompose a phenomenon or effect into its constituents is 
another mode ; whether or not we are able by combining the 
two modes, as in the dynamical sciences, to explain an effect as 
the sum of the several effects of the constituents of its cause. 
This most perfect kind of explanation, this combination, is 
reached only in dynamical science, and was never pretended 
to by the clear-headed Greeks who speculated so widely on the 
nature of things. That mental events and their combinations 
are fully conditioned, as events, on material ones is all that they 
ever pretended to believe ; and in this opinion most modern 
physiologists agree with them. These philosophers have fared 
hard at the hands of the aggressive theists, their expounders 
and critics. Thus Bacon, as quoted by Dr. McCosh, says : 
" Even that school which is most accused of atheism doth the 
most demonstrate religion, that is, the school of Leucippus 



382 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



and Democritus and Epicurus. For it is a thousand times 
more credible that four mutable elements and one immutable 
fifth essence, duly and eternally placed, need no God, than that 
an army of infinite small portions or seeds unplaced should have 
produced this order and beauty without a divine marshal." 
Bacon here implicitly attributes to the ancient physicists that 
conception of their opponent Anaxagoras, which may be said 
to be the foundation of the philosophical theism of all subse- 
quent times. It is common to speak of Anaxagoras as having 
introduced into the philosophy of nature the nous, or the inde- 
pendent agency of intelligence. It is not so commonly seen 
that he introduced along with this, and in anthesis to it, a still 
more characteristic idea, that of a primeval chaos. The anti- 
chaotic nous of Anaxagoras is not that of the physicists and the 
pantheists. The only chaos contemplated by the ancient atom- 
ists is the one they saw around them always existing ; one which 
had always existed in the indeterminate confused actual order, 
at any time, of the universe as a whole. Its particular orders 
were regarded as accidents ; that is, not permanent or inherent 
properties of the elements. This last conception, by the way, 
has been grossly abused, accident being interpreted to mean an 
absolutely undetermined event ; an Anaxagorean accident, such 
as might have happened in that primeval chaos, which the 
atomists did not believe in, when " all things were in a confused 
heap," and before " notes intervened to set them in order." That 
" things might all have been such that there was no fitness in 
them, and the most unfit might have survived," is the reason 
Dr. McCosh gives for " discovering an ordinance of intelligence 
and benevolence in the very circumstance that there is a fitness, 
and that the fit survive." So deeply imbedded in his intelli- 
gence is this conception, this essential idea of theism, the pri- 
meval chaos, that because he can conceive an altogether unde- 
monstrable condition of things to have been possible, he postu- 
lates as actual a cause, or a mode of action in a cause, the nous, 
which would have defeated this possibility — a very common and 
almost unconscious kind of a priori argument. 

It thus appears that Dr. McCosh, not less than Professor 
Tyndall, " crosses the boundary of the experimental evidence," 



McCOSH ON TYNDALL. ^Z 

and "revels in hypotheses about world-making and world- 
ending." He " professes," indeed, to found his convictions in 
a Baconian way on " inductions," the name he gives (with- 
out adequately explaining the process) to what most other 
modern thinkers call, and try to explain by the name, " intui- 
tions a priori." In this Dr. McCosh has doubtless confounded 
the effect of repeated assertions and professions of belief with 
the force in producing universal beliefs of invariably repeated 
particular experiences — an effect enforced by that modern 
factitious moral obligation, "the duty of belief"; a duty 
which though urged upon us by modern religious teachers 
with respect to certain ancient speculations, as of Anaxagoras, 
Socrates, and Plato, was far from being felt or admitted by 
these great teachers. Their service to us was in teaching how 
rather than what to think and believe. 

A singular mistake for one who has undertaken to classify 
modern thinkers is committed by Dr. McCosh when he makes 
Comte the founder of the school to which Tyndall, Spencer, 
Huxley, Bain, and even Mr. Darwin are assigned. Two of 
these thinkers — Spencer and Huxley — have publicly disavowed 
and disproved any obligations to Comte. It would be cruel, if 
it were not absurd, to make Comte and Mill responsible, as 
Dr. McCosh does, even in the slightest degree, for the free use 
of hypotheses in science made by these thinkers, and especially 
the use made by the cosmologists among them, by Spencer and 
Tyndall, of hypotheses for " crossing the boundary of the exper- 
imental evidence." Comte all his life, and Mill until late in life, 
resisted even the undulatory theory of light, as involving the 
unverifiable hypothesis of a medium, though most physicists, 
even in Comte's lifetime, admitted the probability of the theory 
which is now universally adopted. It is strange to see the use 
of hypotheses in physical inquiries attributed to Mill's recom- 
mendation, as it is by Dr. McCosh. As well might one attrib- 
ute the invention and recommendation of reasoning to Aris- 
totle ! Mill only systematized, in his " Logic," what physicists 
from Galileo had been constantly doing; and no one at all 
conversant with mathematical and experimental researches is 
ignorant of the fact that the use of hypotheses, as " recommend- 



384 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. - 

ed by Mill," is indispensable in that " interpretation of nature " 
which Bacon recommends. But these hypotheses are, for the 
most part, trial-questions — interrogations of nature ; they are 
scaffoldings which must be taken down, as they are succeeded 
by the tests, the verifications of observation and experiment ; 
they form no part of the finished structure of experimental phi- 
losophy. Comte and Mill, least of all among modern thinkers, 
recommend their use as bridges for " crossing the boundary of 
the experimental evidence," whether by the Lucretian road 
with Tyndall, or on the Anaxagorean highway with McCosh. 



SPECULATIVE DYNAMICS * t 

Whether when a body moves it is proper to say that it is in 
motion, or that the motion is in it, is a question often suggested 
by the language of even the most guarded writers on mathe- 
matical dynamics, \ though the strictly mathematical definitions, 
formulas, theorems, and problems of the science are free from 
any ambiguity. With what meaning the preposition " in " is 
used in these expressions is a further and more pertinent ques- 
tion. If with that meaning which the unmathematical language 
of these writers seems to authorize, then they have really exposed 
themselves and their readers to the difficulty involved in Zeno's 
famous paradox of motion, namely, that since a motion must 
be either in the place of the moving body or in some other 
place, and since the moving body does not move in its place, 
and does not move in any other place, motion is really a con- 
tradiction, and therefore, according to logic, an impossibility. 
The solution of the paradox, for which the science of logic had 
to establish a distinct principle, recognized that in such expres- 
sions the preposition " in " is not properly used in a locative 
sense, but only in the vaguer sense of appertaining to, or being 
predicable of, its object. That a body in motion has the attri- 
bute of motion (that is, the attribute of having a continuously- 
changing distance from some other body, or from some position 
which is regarded as at rest, or as not having this attribute) ; 

* From The Nation, June 3, 1875. 

t " The Mechanism of the Universe and its Primary Effort-exerting Powers. By Au- 
gustus Fendler." Wilmington, Del. : Printed by the " Commercial Printing Company," 
1874. 

\ We follow Professors Thomson and Tait in using "dynamics" in a wide sense, in- 
cluding Statics, in place of " mechanics," which, though commonly used in this sense, is 
more properly the theory of machines and mechanical constructions than that of the ab- 
stract principles of motion and equilibrium. 

17 



$86 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

and the other form of the same fact, namely, that the motion 
in the body is an attribute of the body — are equivalent or en- 
tirely accordant expressions of what is signified by the preposi- 
tion " in." Zeno's paradox is logically solved in such terms as 
these : motion transcends the " sphere " of the locative, or is 
distinct from both the positive and negative, or the contradictory 
locative, meanings of " in." It is neither here nor there as a 
phenomenon, and yet is not an excluded middle, since the con- 
tradiction of this and some other place is a contradiction in re- 
lations, both of which are distinct from the nature of motion. 
Nevertheless, judging by the current language (not mathemat- 
ical), and the past disputes of mathematicians on the definitions 
of force and motion — disputes which, after being settled with- 
in their own province, have been bequeathed to unmathematical 
speculators in dynamical philosophy — we should be inclined, at 
first sight, to allow that such speculators have the warrant of 
high authority for their attempts at revising the fundamental 
conceptions of this science. Whether consciously or not, the 
mathematicians of the seventeenth century and unmathematical 
sciolists of later times were impelled by this old paradox to a 
solution of its difficulty by a metaphysical or non-phenomenal 
conception of the "force of motion," so called, as something 
locatively in a moving body, constituting the substantive or 
sustaining cause of motion ; seeing that the phenomenon itself 
of motion, being a continuous change of distance from a fixed 
position, could no more properly be in a body than this very 
distance could be locatively in it. 

Newton from the first, and all competent mathematicians of 
a later time, saw that the mathematical discussion of dynamical 
problems had no concern with any such metaphysical concep- 
tion. The supposed cause of the uniformity of motion in a 
fixed direction which a body has independently of external re- 
lations, or vires impresses, is not any part of dynamical science. 
Moreover, the causes of change in the velocities and directions 
of motion, or these vires impresses, were conceived in a purely 
phenomenal or descriptive way, and measured by actually vis- 
ible and tangible quantities. It was not on account of any 
speculative inability in Newton to conceive a possible ulterior 






SPECULATIVE DYNAMICS. 387 

cause of gravity that he excluded from mathematical dynamics 
the search for it, and remained contented with the descriptive 
quantitative law of its ' action ; but simply because such a re- 
search departed in a direction just the opposite of that which 
led to rigorously-demonstrated explanations of the observed 
phenomena of nature. If any of these phenomena could have 
led, " in a mathematical way," to the law of action in gravita- 
tion, Newton's genius would surely not have failed to deduce 
it from them. He took gravity with its law for an ultimate 
fact, simply because it did not follow as a consequence from 
any other observed laws in the same manner of mathematical 
deduction in which he had shown that Kepler's laws follow 
from it and from the three laws of motion. But even mathe- 
maticians, and especially those of Germany, whose men of 
science are even to this day more given to metaphysics than 
those of other nations, were for a long time haunted by the 
metaphysical spectre of a cause called the "force of motion," 
and supposed to be needed to keep a body agoing as well as to 
set it in motion or bring it to rest. 

The mathematics of this science, however, deals only with the 
defined or measured quantitative phenomenal conditions of per- 
sistence and change in motion ; and the metaphysical mathema- 
ticians were so far true to their science as to seek for a measure 
of this metaphysical cause of motion. A fierce dispute accord- 
ingly arose in the seventeenth century, and was continued into 
the eighteenth, in which the most illustrious men took part, as to 
whether the " force of motion " should be measured or defined 
by the velocity directly or by the square of the velocity. But 
after a bitter contention, prolonged by the rivalries of national 
honor among European scholars, the question was finally seen 
to resolve itself into whether the name vis viva, or " force of 
motion," ought properly to be given to one or to the other meas- 
ure. For all mathematical and experimental purposes, these 
measures were all in all, and were perfectly consistent as meas- 
ures of different phenomena or relations of motion, if only called 
by different names. And it was seen that dynamical science 
could get along perfectly well without any use of the confusing 
word " force." But the word continues still to have at least 



388 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

four distinct meanings in dynamical science — technical mean- 
ings related to the use of the word in mathematical reasonings, 
which are never, however, confounded by mathematicians. All 
that is really common to them is a vague reference to the pro- 
duction or persistence of states of motion or rest. The real 
gists of their meanings are in the qualifying terms annexed to 
them, as in the vis impressa of Newton or the vis mortua of 
Leibnitz, otherwise called vis accelei-atrix, the vis insita or vis 
inei'tice, the vis viva, and the vis motrix. In place of these 
names, modern treatises often use, without the substantive word, 
the terms acceleration (retardation being a minus or algebraical- 
ly negative acceleration); secondly, mass (the coefficient of 
-velocity, or of its square, in estimating either); thirdly, the 
momentum ; and, fourthly, the eiiergy of motion. But the term 
energy still has that metaphysical taint of vagueness, even with 
modern mathematical writers, which so long infected the word 
" force." It is still spoken of, both with reference to its actual 
and potential forms, as if it were something locatively in the 
moving body, or in a body capable of a defined motion ; in- 
stead of being only predicably in the permanent internal and 
the special external conditions, which mathematically determine 
relative movements and their rates of change. It is not sur- 
prising that an unmathematical speculator in dynamics should 
be misled by such expressions as the following from the eminent 
authors, Professors Thomson and Tait, to which many parallel 
expressions in other authors might be added, namely, "A raised 
weight, a bent spring, compressed air, etc., are stores of energy 
which can be made use of at pleasure." A mathematician, 
knowing in what terms these antecedent conditions of motion 
are expressed and measured, understands them to refer only to 
sensible properties in these " stores," together with the restrain- 
ing causes which also have sensible measures, namely, what 
makes them " stores," or holds the weight up, or the spring bent, 
or the air compressed. It is in the being held up, or bent, or 
compressed — in these antecedent circumstances, as well as in 
what is locatively in the bodies, that the storing of energy con- 
sists ; and this energy is also dependent in the case of the raised 
weight on an equally sensible and measurable outward relation, 
namely, distance from the ground. 



SPECULATIVE DYNAMICS. 



3«9 



The word "force," unqualified, but understood to be limited 
to the meaning and descriptive measure of " accelerative force," 
or in a strictly-defined and technical meaning, is still commonly- 
employed in treatises on dynamics. Otherwise it is always 
qualified, as in the "force of inertia." All its uses in mathe- 
matical language, or the equivalent terms, acceleration, mass, 
momentum, and energy, refer to precise, unambiguous defini- 
tions in the measures of the phenomena of motion, and do not 
refer to any other substantive or noumenal existence than the 
universal inductive fact that the phenomena of all actual move- 
ments in nature can be clearly, and definitely, or intelligently 
analyzed into phenomena, and conditions of phenomena, of 
which these terms denote the measures. In modern dynamics, 
the mathematical measures of actual phenomena are their real 
essences, as scientific facts. Even the much-derided Aristot- 
elian doctrine in explanation of the various phenomena of suc- 
tion — namely, " nature's abhorrence of a vacuum " — might pass 
muster in science (though not now as an ultimate principle) if 
a determination of how much nature's abhorrence amounts to 
under defined circumstances were attached to it. The real 
fault of the principle and its pretended explanations would be 
paralleled if we should seek to explain the movements of the 
planets and of falling bodies by ■" nature's abhorrence of divorce 
between bodies " — which is about what the word " attraction " 
meant to the lively imaginations of Newton's contemporaries, 
as with Huy gens — without estimating, as the Newtonian law 
of gravity does, how much this abhorrence amounts to under 
given external relations. The fact that nature has an abhor- 
rence of a vacuum mathematically dependent on the weight of 
the liquid forced into it is not impugned by the fact, subsequent- 
ly discovered, that this weight is balanced by the weight and 
consequent pressure of the atmosphere, any more than Kepler's 
three descriptive and quantitative laws were invalidated by the 
subsequent deduction of them from the laws of motion and of 
gravity. Kepler's laws served, indeed, as the most effective 
inductive confirmations of these laws and their universality; 
and Newton's law of gravity would still hold the honored place 
it has in science even if it should in future be shown to follow 



39 o PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

from independently demonstrated and simpler, more ultimate 
conditions of changes in motion. Merely speculative explan- 
ations of it have no honor at all; for its merits are in its being 
a precise quantitatively-descriptive law, and on this ground 
alone it holds its place in mathematical dynamics. 

We have said that the word " force," when used without 
qualification, has come to mean unambiguously what, for the 
sake of avoiding ambiguity, Newton called vis impressa; so 
that in recent treatises the first law of motion is expressed in 
such terms as these : " A body under the action of no force, or 
of balanced forces, is either at rest or moves uniformly in a 
straight line." Newton's words were : " Nisi quatenus a viribus 
impressis." Now, our author, apparently ignorant of the his- 
tory of the science, and without any guidance from its mathe- 
matics, undertakes to criticise such a statement (Section VI.), 
simply on the ground that he* has chosen, without giving any 
reasons for it, to give the unqualified word " force " a different 
meaning in what he is pleased to call an axiom (Axiom VIII., 
p. 12). He means by it the cause which keeps a body agoing 
when it moves. Of this cause modern dynamical science knows 
nothing, except the negative fact stated in the first law of mo- 
tion, which may be given with even greater clearness without 
using the word " force " at all — namely, that, independently of 
properties through which a body is related to other bodies, or 
independently of such relations, its state of rest or of uniform 
motion in a fixed direction is unchanged. Behind this fact, 
except so far as it serves to define the word " force," or vis im- 
pressa, dynamic science does not go ; but it goes forward with 
this and other facts to most fruitful results in mathematical de- 
ductions, with which our author does not appear to be at all 
acquainted. Another fact, the second law of motion, which 
again may be fully expressed without the use of " force," is 
that the change in the component of a velocity in any direction 
may be measured in terms of a fixed property, namely, mass, 
and special outward relations, which in general are dependent 
simply on distances and directions. 

Mathematical dynamics knows of no bodies at rest in any 
absolute sense. All the motions known or considered are rel- 



SPECULATIVE DYNAMICS. 



39 1 



ative motions — namely, continuous changes of distances be- 
tween bodies, or between these and positions defined by other 
bodies. It is not known that even the centre or average posi- 
tion of all the masses of the universe is at rest in any absolute 
sense ; so that the absolute motion of no body is known, and 
the "force" of our author is without any definite measure or 
utility in mathematical dynamics. The principle of relative 
motion leaves all measures of motion considered as absolute 
quite out of the problems of this science, as indeed they are 
quite beyond our possible knowledge. 

One of the principles of mathematical dynamics which stag- 
gers the unmathematical sciolist more than any other, and was 
at first one of the greatest difficulties, even with mathematicians, 
in the Newtonian theory of gravity — a difficulty repeatedly 
urged; and brought out from apparently independent medita- 
tions by anti-Newtonian heretics — is the doctrine of " action 
at a distance." This action, the metaphysicians say, is impos- 
sible, and they devote themselves to the invention of media 
through which force and motion may be communicated, or 
from which it may be collected (Axiom VII., p. n), thinking 
that thereby they are helping out the mathematical genius of 
Newton by a profounder effort of thought than he was capable 
of. But with metaphysical action dynamical science has noth- 
ing to do. The action at a distance, considered in this science, 
is simply a change in motion measurably or mathematically de- 
pendent on (or a function of) distances from bodies, distances 
of which nothing is asserted but that they extend indefinitely 
beyond the masses or the visible and tangible limits of bodies. 
" A body cannot act where it is not " — " With all my heart," 
says Carlyle, " only where is it ? " If attractive force is an at- 
tribute of bodies (as it is whether or not this force depends on 
an intangible and invisible medium), then the presence of 
bodies at a distance from their visible limits must be assumed, 
so far at least as this attribute is concerned. The color of a 
body is familiarly known to be distinct from its solid extent, 
volume, or mass, and is not in the same place; nevertheless, as 
superficial, is still contiguous with its other sensible qualities. 
The metaphysical difficulty of believing that the attribute of 



39 2 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

attraction may be still more displaced or removed than color, 
is a difficulty which disappears with its cause, namely, un- 
familiarity with the conception. Patient study of mathematical 
and experimental science has resolved many such difficulties, 
which are not really logical ones ; for whether gravity will ever 
come in science to be a legitimately derived attribute or prop- 
erty of bodies acting through a medium, or will forever remain, 
as now, an ultimate phenomenal fact, there is nothing of con- 
tradiction or essential opposition to experience in its asserted 
action at a distance— at a distance, that is, not of course from 
where it acts, but from the places where other attributes of body 
are manifested ; that is, beyond its visible and tangible limits. 
Most theories of a gravitative medium have been in fact atomic, 
and, by the interposition of voids between atoms which is thus 
made, have really introduced the very action at a distance 
which the theories were devised to do away with. Indeed, the 
essential principle of action at a distance is a necessary conse- 
quence of the metaphysical axiom (which we are not, however, 
obliged by positive evidence to accept), that pure continuous 
matter is incompressible, as in the supposed atoms ; and though- 
this action be only on a molecular scale, it is no more possible 
on this scale than on that larger one of gravitative action which 
mathematical dynamics is supposed to assume. But, as we 
have said, no such metaphysical assumption is made in this 
science. 

No student of mathematics, competent to pass an examina- 
tion in Newton's " Principia," not only on its definitions, axioms, 
and philosophical scholiums, but on its mathematical theorems 
and problems, could read with any profit, or even with any pa- 
tience, Mr. Fendler's speculations. Those parts of the " Prin- 
cipia," or of more modern treatises, which such thinkers as our 
author appear to have studied, present themselves to the student 
who has clearly seen their embodiment in the mathematical 
deductions and experimental verifications of dynamical science 
in a wholly different light from that in which such speculative 
thinkers take them up. The laws or axioms and the definitions 
of this science are apparently considered by these thinkers as 
constituting in themselves a complete body of doctrine, capable 



SPECULATIVE DYNAMICS. ^Z 

of being studied and criticised quite independently of any other 
mathematics than what they directly involve, whereas they are 
really integrant parts or elements of a systematic deductive 
science; and whether or not they are evident at a glance 
through familiar inductions, or by "intuitions a priori" (as 
some thinkers will have it), they have their truest proof in the 
broadest possible tests of experience, through the experimental 
and observational verifications of" their mathematical conse- 
quences. Of the nature and force of this kind of proof none 
but students of mathematical dynamics and experimental phys- 
ics can be supposed to have any adequate conception. To at- 
tempt to criticise the elementary conceptions and first principles 
of the science in any other way, and especially a priori, or with 
a simple reference to Vemunft, is- really a display of the critic's 
incompetency, which is not remedied by a reference of his con- 
victions to ancestral experience, or any other modification of 
the a priori doctrine, or any treatment of mathematical axioms 
as philosophical truths. Several modern writers, more distin- 
guished than our author, and especially of late Mr. G. H. Lewes 
and Mr. H. Spencer, have thus illustrated how a priori too oft- 
en means no more than ab ignorantia et indolentia. Such writers 
appear to think that the mathematical deductions of the science 
are of secondary importance from a philosophical point of view, 
or are merely illustrative applications of philosophical principles 
to the processes of nature. But instead of the mathematical 
body of the science being an appendage to these principles as 
to an independent body of doctrines, these are themselves 
chosen and framed, so to speak, or determined in their forms 
and meanings with reference to the mathematics of a systematic 
deductive science. 



BOOKS RELATING TO THE THEORY OF EVO- 
LUTION* 

A correspondent asks for information on books relating to 
the development or evolution theory, especially for the book 
" which is not too partisan or too technical, but gives the facts 
and reasoning with reference to it on both sides." From a 
literature which has in the past fifteen years grown into an ex- 
tensive department of bibliography, we ought to be able, if this 
were possible in any subjects of discussion, to select the book 
which fulfills these requisites. Yet it would be vain to seek, 
even in Germany, for one which surpasses in these qualities the 
foundation and first of the series, namely, Darwin's " Origin of 
Species," in which, and especially in the last edition, 1872, all 
the scicfitific objections that have been urged against the theory, 
as it is held by Darwinians, are more clearly put and fairly con- 
sidered than in any treatise we could name. In no work on a 
subject of which the scientific evidence is essentially technical, 
is the fault of technicality less obtrusive ; and in late editions 
this is still further remedied by a glossary of scientific terms. 
But before we can clearly characterize other books on this sub- 
ject, it is necessary to make a grand division of the department 
into books that are strictly (like Darwin's), or predominantly, 
scientific and inductive; and those that treat their subject as a 
part, or as the foundation even (like Mr. Spencer's series), of 
general speculative philosophy, and in connection with theology 
and religion. Darwin's books have been improperly charac- 
terized as speculative. This is true of them only in the sense 
in which incompletely verified scientific hypotheses are called 
speculative; in the sense in which Newton's astronomy was, 

* From the Nation, February iS, 1875. 



BOOKS RELATIVE TO EVOLUTION. 3^ 

until completely, or very nearly, verified; or (by a fairer in- 
stance) Newton's optics, which, in a main point, is not verified, 
but reversed.* It is to the subjects of Darwin's books, and not 
to his opinions or treatment, that the term speculative is ap- 
plicable, if at all ; and so far as it is applicable as a reproach, it 
applies equally, or even more, to the opinions of his opponents. 
His mode of treatment is strictly scientific, Newtonian, or 
"positive"; nowhere dealing with disputed axioms, or with 
deductions from axioms laid down as a priori valid and as if 
they were not disputed; nowhere considering scientific theses 
as either favorable or unfavorable to general philosophical or 
religious conclusions, except, of course, where religious teach- 
ing, in having prejudged these questions on other than scientific 
grounds, is presumed to have exceeded by obiter dicta its proper 
jurisdiction. With the great majority, however, of writers on 
this subject the names of Darwin and Spencer are closely as- 
sociated ; though to more than one Aristotelian master, and to 
many scientific students of the subjects, no two names are more 
widely separated by essential differences of method. Mr. Spen- 
cer has lately put forward the claim that his method is justified 
by Newton's precepts and practice. But, according to the 
judgment of the more immediate followers of Newton, the lead- 
ing physicists of to-day, this claim is not substantiated. 

The dispute is, however, quite aside from the reality of the 
distinction which, for bibliographical purposes, we here lay 
down. One of the requisitions of our- correspondent is not ful- 
filled by any book of the properly speculative division. We 
venture to assert that in no department of speculative philoso- 
phy, either expository or historical, do treatises exist which fair- 
ly present the facts and arguments on both sides. This virtue 
is possible only within the limits which scientific, Newton- 
ian, or " positive " method imposes ; and within his own proper 
department of natural science every expert authority is a pos- 
itivist, whether on other subjects he denies, or ignores, or only 

* Speculative philosophy is properly metaphysics, and proceeds deductively from axi- 
oms, like Plato's or Kant's, or Mr. Spencer's later form of a priori philosophy, which he 
professes to found, in part, on the empirical facts of heredity, and thus give it a scientific 
basis. 



396 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

waives the disputed axioms. The essential characteristic of 
properly speculative as distinguished from scientific method is, 
that the former seeks to expel doubt by the furcular force of 
the dilemma that unless one accepts as having universal valid- 
ity certain axioms, which it is true are only illustrated, not veri- 
fied by inductive evidences, one is not entitled to hold any 
beliefs at all with any certainty. Choice axioms are therefore 
presented, illustrated, and a universology is deduced from them. 
True scientific virtue, on the other hand, is to balance evidences, 
and to bring doubts to civil terms; to resist the enthusiasm of 
these aggressive axioms, and to be contented with the beliefs 
which are only the most probable, or most authentic on strictly 
inductive grounds. Now in the proper scientific theory of 
" evolution " — unhappily so called, as confounding it with a 
different mode of treatment, when any of the successive pre- 
ceding names, " descent with modification," " derivation," 
" development," or " transmutation " would on this score have 
been better, notwithstanding a temporary disrepute in the 
name — the scientific evidence is in great measure technical, 
and a considerable part of what has accumulated in the 
past fifteen years is buried from the general reader in mono- 
graphs of scientific publications. Essays and discourses in 
exposition of Darwinism or natural selection are far too numer- 
ous ; the majority being better calculated to make the author 
shudder than to illuminate what is best got from a careful read- 
ing of his original treatise. Among brief and good essays we 
may mention Professor Huxley's little books on the " Origin of 
Species," and " Man's Place in Nature " ; Mr. Wallace's collec- 
tion of essays with the title of " Natural Selection " (though some 
of these are too speculative to come under the head of natural 
science) ; and Mr. Mivart's " Genesis of the Species," which 
though learned in biological science, is in many parts too spec- 
ulative or un-Newtonian to be mentioned under this head. We 
may add a little book called the " Philosophy of Evolution," by 
B. T. Lowne, published in 1873, by Van Voorst, London, 
which received one of the Actonian prizes of the Royal Insti- 
tution for 1872. This is mainly scientific, though it touches on 
the general philosophical or speculative bearings of the subject. 



BOOKS RELATIVE TO EVOLUTION. 397 

Of works more unequivocally of the speculative class, Mr. 
Spencer's generally, but more especially his " Biology," deserve 
a first place. We should not, however, in this case, as we do 
in Mr. Darwin's, recommend the original so much as a recent- 
ly published exposition, which, under the title of " Cosmic Phil- 
osophy," is given by Mr. John Fiske. In this book, the disciple 
far surpasses the master in readableness and skill of exposition. 
Of a large subdivision of the speculative class — the books whose 
aim is practical and religious, and opposed to theories of evo- 
lution — no one has come to our notice which fairly presents 
the exact points or the scientific arguments of the theory as it 
is now generally held by naturalists, and few of them apparent- 
ly deem it essential to their aim to do so. Finally, we may 
add to the scientific division of books on the subject a recent 
edition of Darwin's " Descent of Man," renewed by the fiery 
ordeal of criticism to which the first edition was subjected, and 
perfected, so far as scientific fairness and method can go, by 
the author's unbounded patience of thought and research. 



GERMAN DARWINISM.* 

A few months ago, in answer to the inquiries of a corre- 
spondent about books on evolution, we took occasion to point 
out and emphasize a division, very fundamental and important 
in our view, in books on this subject, namely, between those 
which treat of it as a theorem of natural history from a Bacon- 
ian or scientific point of view, either mainly or exclusively (con- 
fining themselves to scientific considerations of proof), and those 
which treat of evolution as a philosophical thesis deductively, 
and as a part of a system of metaphysics. Such a division 
separates the names of Darwin and Spencer (which are popu- 
larly so often pronounced together) as widely as. any two names 
could be separated on real grounds of distinction. 

Two little books have lately been published which we may 
add to the short lists we gave of popular works on evolution — 
one to each list, t Professor Oscar Schmidt's " Descent and 
Darwinism " is essentially a scientific treatise, though of a type 
which could hard]y have been produced originally in the En- 
glish language, or from a Baconian stand-point, and for English 
students of science. Of its peculiarities we propose to speak 
further on. The second book belongs to the speculative or 
metaphysical branch of the subject, and consists of two essays : 
one, translated from the French of Dr. Cazelles, is an account 
of Mr. Spencer's philosophy, and a comparison of it with M. 
Comte's ; the other essay is a lecture by Dr. Youmans, given 

* From the Nation, September 9, 1875. 

t "The Doctrine of Descent and Darwinism. By Oscar Schmidt, Professor in the 
University of Strasburg," 1875. 

"Outline of the Evolution-Philosophy. By Dr. M. E. Cazelles. Translated from the 
French by the Rev. O. B. Frothingham. With an Appendix by E. L. Youmans, M. 
D.," 1875. 



GERMAN DARWINISM. 399 

in defense of Mr. Spencer's claims to the credit of establishing 
the doctrine of evolution. Dr. Cazelles's essay is an interesting 
account of Mr. Spencer's theories by a fair-minded disciple — 
by as fair-minded a disciple as one could well be who is at all 
disposed to yield not merely to claims on one's assent for the 
sake of argument or system, but on one's adhesion to undem- 
onstrated beliefs asserted to be axiomatic and irresistible. But 
a system like Mr. Spencer's is obliged to stand on such positions. 
To us it is inconceivable (and therefore, according to one of 
Mr. Spencer's criteria, opposed to truth) that any one should 
not resent at every step the asserted demonstrations which Mr. 
Spencer parades. Neither Dr. Cazelles nor Dr. Youmans be- 
gins, however, far enough back in their accounts of the origin 
and progress of Mr. Spencer's thoughts. These were really 
theological in origin, and have never departed from the theo- 
logical stand-point. For it is one thing to arrive at solutions of 
problems different from those commonly held, or from the or- 
thodox, and quite another thing to outgrow or be drawn by 
legitimate studies aside from the problems themselves. Believ- 
ers -in philosophies of the unknowable are very much in the 
state of mind towards the theological problems of their earlier 
years in which the converted savage is towards the powers and 
attributes of the idols, which his reason has come to pronounce 
no other in fact than common blocks' or stones. Presenting 
evidence to this effect does not really diminish the savage's 
practical belief that his idols are pre-eminently ugly or awful, 
and preternaturally, though unapparently, unphenomenally, 
great. To get rid of this belief he must destroy the really harm- 
less blocks. To have believed strongly without due evidence 
is a state of mind not easily convertible, when due evidence is 
seen to be wanting, into one to which the object is absolutely 
without existence, but is more commonly changed into one in 
which the old interest remains and the object still affects the 
believer as an unconditioned, unproved, un demonstrable, but 
not less pragmatically real existence; and this is the real start- 
ing-point of Mr. Spencer's philosophy. 

Dr. Cazelles thinks that Mr. Spencer " freed his theory from 
all metaphysical attachments " when he came in the course of 



4 oo PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

his thought to dismiss the moral or teleological implication of 
the word " progress," and substituted the word " evolution " as 
the more appropriate, name for the abstraction which he sought 
to define as the fundamental idea of the universe ; and when 
he also substituted in his formula of definition the word " inte- 
gration " for the " individuation " which he first thought to be 
the true form or idea of progress. The theory was doubtless 
thus freed from attachment to any received form of speculation 
on the nature of life and being, but not at all freed from the 
scope and method of metaphysics — this scope being systematic 
omniscience, including even the unknowable. The method of 
metaphysics is to treat of detached abstractions — that is, ab- 
stractions without check in definition and precision, from the 
concrete examples and embodiments to which Plato, not less 
than Bacon, pointed as indispensable guides to clearness and 
truth. There is no profound difficulty in conceiving what prog- 
ress means, if we qualify the question by the consideration of 
the concretes in which progress is made ; not even if we extend 
our inquiry to the vague ranking of organisms as higher and 
lower. The essential error of metaphysics, or " realism," is not 
merely in attributing to an abstraction a truly individual, thing- 
like existence, or making it a "realized abstraction," but in 
treating it as if it had such an existence — in other words, as if 
it had a meaning independently of the things which ought to 
determine the true limits and precision of its meaning. Thus, 
to apply the mechanical law of the conservation of force, which, 
as a scientific truth, has no meaning beyond the nature and 
conditions of material movements (whether these are within or 
outside of an organism) — to apply this law analogically to all 
sorts of changes — to the " movements " of society, for example 
— is, in effect, metaphysics, and strips the law of all the merits 
of truth it has in the minds and judgments of physical philoso- 
phers, or of those through whose experimental and mathemat- 
ical researches it came to have the clear, distinct, precise, though 
technical meanings in science that constitute its only real mer- 
its. The daring ignorance which in this speculation undertook 
to change the name of the principle, to call it " persistence of 
force," supposing the word " force " to refer to an incognizable 



GERMAN DA R WINISM. 40 i 

substratum of causation, and not, as it really does in science, 
to various measurably interchangeable forms of material move- 
ment and antecedent conditions of movement (wholly phe- 
nomenal), gave the author's use of the principle the character 
pre-eminently of metaphysics. We remember, as its most char- 
acteristic feature, this attempt in Mr. Spencer's " First Princi- 
ples " to eke out his barren " system " of abstractions by wresting 
and corrupting the very type of unmetaphysical scientific truth 
to the vagueness of a principle of the " unknowable." The prin- 
ciple of the " conservation of force " does refer, indeed, to what 
thus appeared to be hopelessly unknowable to such a mind — 
namely, to the experimental and mathematical measures which 
determine its real meaning and proof. The climax of the specu- 
lation was capped when this principle was declared to be an 
undemonstrable but irresistible axiom — what we cannot help 
believing when we have once conceived it ! 

In the same way, "evolution" is, with Mr. Spencer, not a 
theorem of inductive science, but a necessary truth deduced 
from axioms; and nothing can be more mistaken, therefore, 
than Dr. Youmans's defense of Spencer's claim to credit for 
substantiating a doctrine also, unfortunately, called " evolution " 
— the doctrine of the origin of species by " descent, with modi- 
fication," which is wholly due to the labors of leading English 
and German naturalists — real workers in experimental science. 
Dr. Youmans, unfortunately for his defense, quotes (p. 125) 
Spencer's acknowledgment that, though in 1852, or earlier, he 
had conceived of the principle of " the survival of the fittest," 
he had not conceived of it as producing the diversities of living 
beings, or conceived of the co-operation of natural selection 
with indefinite variations to produce species. But this last is 
the whole gist of the matter, so far as mere conception is con- 
cerned ; and the merit — though this is a small part of Darwin's 
merit in the matter — of this conception belongs so completely 
to him and to Mr. Wallace that the half-glimpses of the con- 
ception by earlier writers are of small account. Even Aristotle 
had conceived of the cause now called natural selection, in one 
of its modes of action ; and two English writers — Dr. Wells and 
Mr. Patrick Matthew — in 1813 and 1831, set forth the agency 



4 02 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

of this cause in more extended but still limited forms, the latter 
coming very near to the views of Darwin and Wallace. So far 
as other elements of the doctrine of descent ought to go to any 
single thinker's credit, they undoubtedly belong to Lamarck, to 
whom, at the beginning of this century, and not to Mr. Spen- 
cer, the following introductory remark by Dr. Youmans is just- 
ly applicable- — namely, that while the idea of evolution " was 
passing through what may be called its stage of execration, 
there was no hesitancy in according to him all the infamy of its 
paternity ; but when infamy is to be changed to honor, by a 
kind of perverse consistency of injustice, there turns out to be 
a good deal less alacrity in making the revised award." In 
applying this remark to Mr. Spencer, as to a long-tried martyr, 
Dr. Youmans is himself guilty of the very injustice towards 
Lamarck of which he complains in behalf of Spencer; for there 
is nothing in Spencer's writing relating to what is really honor- 
ed by men of science (namely, the scientific explanation of the 
origin of species) that is not to be credited either to Lamarck 
or to Darwin. This honor is really awarded to the scientific 
proofs and arguments on the subject, to which many other nat- 
uralists besides these more eminent ones, and especially those 
of Germany, have materially added by their contributions of 
observation and criticism ; so that the theory as it now stands, 
which the sketch by Professor Schmidt sets forth very lucidly, 
is really a scientific theory only, and bears no necessary relation 
to any " system " of philosophy. It is worth noticing here that 
this sketch, though treating the subject historically, and can- 
vassing the merits of various contributions to it in this century 
and the last, in Germany, France, and England, nowhere men- 
tions the name or fame of Mr. Herbert Spencer. 

But in Germany, where the theory first got the name of Dar- 
winism, it is much more of an " ism," or connects itself much 
more intimately with general philosophical views, than in En- 
gland or America, except wiiere in these countries it has got 
confounded with Mr. Spencer's speculations. It is to the sig- 
nificance of this fact — the character of Darwinism in Germany 
— that we wished especially in this review to call attention, as 
an interesting phenomenon in the history of modern speculation, 



GERMAN DARWINISM. 403 

determining the true place and the essential influence of Bacon 
and the Baconian philosophy. German systematic historians 
of philosophy were never able to make out where to place Ba- 
con's so-called philosophy, or indeed to discover that he had a 
philosophy, or, what has appeared to their minds as the same 
thing, a "system." And indeed he had no system; but by 
marshaling the forces of criticism known to his time, and rein- 
forced by his own keen invention, against all systems, past and 
prospective, he aimed at establishing for science a position of 
neutrality, and at the same time of independent respectability, 
between the two hostile schools of the Dogmatics and the Em- 
piricists, though leaning towards the tenets of theology just so 
far as these had practical force and value. He thus secured 
the true status for the advancement of experimental science, or 
of experimental philosophy, as it came to be called. He had 
less need of doing, and deserves less credit for what is more 
commonly credited to him — namely, laying down the rules of 
scientific pursuit, which the progress of science has itself much 
more fully determined. But what could be more fit as a crit- 
icism of such a " system " as Mr. Spencer's than these aphor- 
isms from the first book of the " Novum Organum " ? 

"Some men become attached to particular sciences and contemplations, 
either from supposing themselves the authors and inventors of them or 
from having bestowed the greatest pains upon such subjects, and thus 
become most habituated to them. If men of this description apply them- 
selves to philosophy and contemplations of a universal nature, they wrest 
and corrupt them by their preconceived fancies, of which Aristotle affords 
us a signal instance, who made his natural philosophy completely subservi- 
ent to his logic, and thus rendered it little more than useless and disputa- 
tious. The chemists, again [those of Bacon's time], have formed a fan- 
ciful philosophy from a few experiments of the furnace. Gilbert, too [a 
contemporary of Bacon's], having employed himself most assiduously in 
the consideration of the magnet, immediately established a system of 
philosophy to coincide with his favorite pursuit." 

And again: 

"In general, men take for the groundwork of their philosophy either 
too much from a few topics or too little from many; in either case, their 
philosophy is founded on too narrow a basis of experiment and natural his : 
tory, and decides on too scanty grounds; for the theoretic philosopher 
seizes various common circumstances by experiment, without reducing 
them to certainty or examining and frequently considering them, and re- 
lies for the rest upon meditation and the activity of his wit." 



4 o 4 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

Under the Baconian regime the physical sciences have flour- 
ished in Great Britain for more than two centuries; while 
" philosophy," as it is known in Germany, both orthodox and 
heterodox, has dwindled, except so far as it has had practical 
holds and bearings on one side through theology in religious 
teachings, or has been reinforced from time to time on both sides 
from the Continent. In Germany the position of the experi- 
mental sciences was far otherwise until near the beginning of 
this century. The sun of Baconism has not even yet shone 
fully on the German mind, or except as reflected from the. posi- 
tion which the sciences have so long held in Great Britain 
and France, as compared to the claims of any systems of 
philosophy. That such a system as Oken's Naturp kilo sop hie, 
with its vague and meaningless abstractions, was an influence 
at the beginning of the present century, is not, however, so 
surprising as perhaps it would be if Mr. Spencer's system (bear- 
ing a much greater resemblance to it than to any theories of 
Darwin), had not got such a footing with English-thinking 
readers as it appears to have. There is, however, at present 
in Germany an ascetic school of experimental and inductive 
science, which deprives itself of the aid and guidance of theo- 
retical and deductive considerations, in order the more effectu- 
ally to protect itself from their undue influence. These Ge- 
lehrteii are not true Baconians ; but their method might be ap- 
propriately named "experimentalism." Men of science in 
Germany have in general never considered themselves as in a 
respectable neutral position with reference to opposite systems 
of philosophy, and Professor Schmidt in his preface accord- 
ingly consents to the cry from both sides in philosophy, "Avow 
your colors"; and proceeds in his introduction to define his 
stand-point sharply on several subjects which cultivated English 
liberal thinkers would consider as irrelevant to the theme of 
his book — e. g., against "dualism " in vital phenomena, against 
miracles and other metaphysical positions. 

Nothing could be more in keeping, on the other hand, with 
the refinement of modern English Baconism than the manner 
in which Darwin presents the doctrine of descent in his " Origin 
of Species"; and as his scientific inquiry did not touch upon 



GERMAN DARWINISM. 



405 



the origin of life itself — but only on the origin of its various 
forms and their relations to one another and to their surround- 
ings, he even took a pleasure — a poetical, not a dogmatic one, 
surely — in presenting in religious language his sense of the 
scientific mystery of life, speaking of "life with its several pow- 
ers having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few 
forms or into one," etc. Upon this often-quoted passage our 
author prosily remarks that "in this Darwin has certainly been 
untrue to himself, and it satisfies neither those who believe in 
the continuous work of creation by a personal God, nor the 
partisans of natural evolution." We doubt if Darwin cared to 
satisfy any but those who are willing to mark the boundary by 
a slight difference of style in speaking of the two; between 
what is evident or probable on experimental grounds, and 
what as yet baffles all approaches of experimental inquiry. It 
is a little incongruous that one so pre-eminently cautious and 
painstaking, so little speculative or metaphysical in the range 
of his researches, should be hailed as chief by so large a con- 
stituency of what really amounts to a philosophical school; 
albeit they are the brightest minds of Germany, and pre-emi- 
nently men of science. Professor Schmidt's book is in form, 
however, and in effect, a thorough and learned scientific treat- 
ise, though he takes grounds, as the earlier French disciples of 
Newton did, on matters extraneous to his scientific subject. 



A FRAGMENT ON CAUSE AND EFFECT. 

" Thought is a secretion of the brain " was the announcement 
of a distinguished naturalist and physiologist, which excited 
strong aversion to those studies and views of nature which could 
thus degrade, as it appeared to do, the dignity of so important 
a function of life. What was, probably, meant, however, by 
the saying, is the physiological truth that the brain is the organ 
of thought in a manner analogous to that in which a gland is 
the organ of secretions, or a muscle of contractions, or the 
heart and vascular system of circulations. Thought no more 
resembles a secretion, however, than this resembles a contrac- 
tion, or than either of these resembles the movements and effects 
of circulation; not so much, indeed, as these three resemble each 
other ; yet, like all these three kinds of action, it is dependent, as 
physiological investigations show, on the intimate structure and 
vital activity of a special tissue, and its living arrangements and 
special changes in the brain. It is altogether likely that this is 
what was meant, and all that was meant, by the somewhat sinis- 
ter and disagreeable observation that " thought is a secretion 
of the brain." Men of science sometimes resort to paradoxes, 
figures of speech, concrete ways of stating truths in science, 
which those who are ignorant of the science and its real ground 
of evidence, but imagine that they can judge of its conclu- 
sions, are almost sure to misunderstand. Irony is not a more 
dangerous figure than such a use of comparisons and illus- 
trative figures of speech. Men of science are supposed, ex- 
cept by other men of science, to be literal and exact, and 
unlike poets, in all their utterances, and when, as Professor Carl 
Vogt did in the present instance, they seek to impress the 
imagination by a comparison or figure which is made at the ex- 



A FRAGMENT ON CAUSE AND EFFECT. 407 

pense of sentiment, their expositions are almost sure to be mis- 
conceived, not only by those who are ignorant of their science 
and its grounds of inference, but even by the more sentimental 
and unreflective student of the science. What these persons 
seem to have supposed to be meant is not that thought and its 
expression are allotted to the brain as a secretion is to a gland, 
but that thought is a function in life which, as function, is of no 
more worth or dignity than the functions of the kidneys or of a 
cutaneous gland. It is altogether probable, however, that a 
certain feeling of impatience or contempt for the sentimental 
shallowness which could so misinterpret a scientific comparison, 
and confound it with moral or practical considerations is a real 
motive prompting to the utterance of shocking paradoxes, in 
disregard alike of the practical effect and of scientific clearness 
and discrimination in the communications of truth. Native 
common sense is too apt to be coarse and barbarous in its man- 
ners, and too inconsiderate of weakness. 

We will not venture to say that this was the case with the 
distinguished biologist whose words have been the cause of so 
much scandal. The metaphysical doctrine of materialism so 
often charged against or imputed to such scientific thinkers, is, 
in fact, a doctrine quite foreign to science, quite out of its range. 
It belongs, so far as it is intelligible, to the sphere of sentiment, 
moral feeling and practical principles. A thinker is properly 
called a materialist when he concludes that his appetites and 
passions and actions, having material objects and results for 
their motives, are those most worthy of serious consideration. 
This does not imply that he believes that natures so different 
as thoughts, sensations, bodies liquid and solid and their move- 
ments, are all fundamentally of the same nature, or are natures 
some of which are derived from certain other more fundamental 
ones among them : the spiritual from the material ones. It 
does not imply the opinion that thought is constituted of mo- 
tions or liquids, does not even imply that the materialist thinker 
believes in, or knows anything about, the truth that actual 
thinking depends, phenomenally, on the tissues, structures and 
conditions of an organ, as intimately as the liquid secretions 
and the internal and external movements of a living body do. 



4 o8 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

Scientific doctrines and investigations are exclusively concerned 
with connections in phenomena which are susceptible of dem- 
onstration by inductive observation, and independent of di- 
versities or resemblances in their hidden natures, or of any ques- 
tion about their metaphysical derivation, or dependence. 

That like produces like, and that an effect must resemble its 
cause are shallow scholastic conceptions, hasty blunders of gen- 
eralization, which science repudiates : and with them it repu- 
diates the scholastic classification or distinction of material and 
spiritual which depended on these conceptions, or supposed 
that a cause conferred its nature on its effect, or that the con- 
ditions of a cause by the combination of their natures consti- 
tuted the nature of the effect. This, in a sense, — in an iden- 
tical or tautological sense — is indeed true;, but from this true, 
though identical, sense a false and mischievous one was gener- 
alized, and still continues to corrupt and misinterpret the results 
of scientific observation. 

In discovering anything to be the cause of something else we 
have added to our knowledge of the nature of the first thing. 
We have included in our conception of this thing the attribute 
of its producing, or being the cause of, the second. If now this 
attribute of it be the most prominent quality of it in our regard, 
as it is in contemplating a cause qua cause, the effect may, in 
an identical sense, be said to be constituted by its cause. In 
this view all the other attributes of the cause are subordinated 
to the attribute of producing a defined effect, or are regarded 
as accidental or non-essential attributes, and this is the view of 
the elementary relations in geometry and mathematics generally 
which abstraction produces, and is the source of the semblance 
of demonstrative certainty, and objective necessity which math- 
ematical theorems have. But when science discovers, by in- 
duction or empirically, a new cause, the thing previously known 
by other attributes, to- which is now added the attribute of pro- 
ducing a given or defined effect, has nothing in its essential or 
previously defining attributes at all resembling, implying or 
constituting its effect, and its newly discovered attribute of pro- 
ducing this effect remains among the added, subordinate or ac- 
cidental attributes of such a cause. In its essence it does not 



A FRAGMENT ON CAUSE AND EFFECT. 



409 



imply, suggest or resemble its effect, and in this case the assertion 
that the nature of the cause determines or defines the nature of 
its effect, is clearly seen, so far as it is true, to be an identical 
proposition, meaning only that the production of the defined 
effect is a part, and a subordinate part, of the nature of a thing. 
The definition of the effect is added to that of the thing which 
is its cause, at least while we are contemplating this as the 
cause of the defined effect, and it is only by refunding to the 
effect what we have thus borrowed from it that we arrive at 
the metaphysician's mathematical conception of causation, the 
transference of the nature of one thing, that is, the cause, to 
another thing, its effect. In mathematics the elements of dem- 
onstration are so selected, by abstraction, and their definition 
so determined that this transference of nature is what is osten- 
sibly done; though it is no more really done than in inferring 
consequents from antecedents, or effects from causes in so-called 
empirical science. In all cases where this appears to be the 
character of the connection of antecedent and consequent, or 
cause and effect, the transference of the nature of the cause to 
its effect, is only a restoration to the effect of natures borrowed 
from it, or into which it is resolvable by analysis. This fact is 
observed especially in mathematical inference, since such infer- 
ence is always from a complex antecedent, or from the combi- 
nation of a number of conditions, of which the aggregate is not 
known, named or defined by any attributes other than those 
which by the analysis and recombinations of mathematical dem- 
onstrations are shown to depend on the most obvious and 
elementary truths of our experience of measured quantities. 
The protasis of a geometrical theorem by the aid of geometrical 
constructions previously shown, or, when ultimate, simply as- 
sumed to be legitimate, is resolved into conditions which, re- 
combined, are the apodosis or conclusion of the proposition. 
These conditions may be used to define the natures of both the 
antecedent or reason, and the consequent, and by this means 
their natures become identical. And both are analyzed ulti- 
mately in the course of a series of demonstrations into a few 
axioms, and these axiomatic truths implied in a few definitions. 
But not only in the mathematical, but also in the so-called em- 
18 



4 io PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

pirical discovery of the connections of antecedent and conse- 
quent, or cause and effect, the antecedent or cause is almost 
always a combination of conditions, or a concurrence of things, 
relations and events, the definition of which in their aggregate, 
in merely logical consideration, may as well be the effect which 
follows, provided this is sufficient for defining it, as be anything 
else ; since this aggregate of conditions is not usually denoted 
by a single name, the connotation of which would define its 
nature. Yet for practical and scientific purposes this aggregate 
is best defined by the enumeration of the conditions that com- 
pose it, to which observation adds the fact, or nature, that it 
will whenever it exists be followed by a given or defined effect. 
In this case the conditions which constitute the cause do not 
constitute the effect. They are simply followed by the effect, 
whose nature is wholly unlike that of its cause, or is like and is 
implied in its cause only so far as the capacity of producing it 
may be thought of identically as a part of the nature of its 
cause. Thus a stone, or any body denser (i) than the air, left 
unsupported (2) above (3) the surface of the earth, will fall (4) 
to it, is a proposition in so-called empirical science, in which 
the conditions (1) (2) (3) form an aggregate to which if we add 
as a part of its nature the result (4), that is, add the uncondi- 
tional tendency to fall inferred from facts of observation, then 
the fall is a necessary consequence of the nature of its anteced- 
ent conditions, and it is like or is implied in this nature, quite 
as truly as any mathematical consequence is necessary, or is 
implied in mathematical protases of causes or antecedents. 
But ordinarily physical philosophers are not so anxious to make 
a scholastic show of demonstration as to surreptitiously add (4) 
to the group of conditions (1) (2) and (3) so as to make out 
their proof on the maxims that like produces like, or that effects 
resemble or partake of the nature of their causes. These max- 
ims are really no more true of abstract reasonings in the ele- 
mentary demonstrations of geometry; but the aim of these 
elementary reasonings justifies the procedures which give ap- 
parent countenance to their maxims. 

Other and real illustrations vaguely related to these apparent 
ones are given in the organic world, in the phenomena of as- 



A FRAGMENT ON CAUSE AND EFFECT. 4II 

similation and reproduction. Tissues turn nutriment into 
substances of the same kind as their own. Offspring resemble 
their parents. These facts, together with the geometrical 
principle of Sufficient Reason appeared to be sufficient grounds 
with scholastic philosophers for generalizing the identity of 
natures in real causes and effects. But, in fact, the very oppo- 
site is true. Elementary relations of antecedence and conse- 
quence are always those of unlikeness. A simple nature or 
phenomenon A is invariably followed by, or joined with, an- 
other different one B. Weight in a body manifested to us 
primarily by pressure, or in the tension of our muscles through 
the statical muscular sense, is a simple nature not resembling 
or implying at all the downward movement which always 
follows it when isolated or freed from other forces or con- 
ditions that are of a nature to produce an opposite effect, 
namely, an elastic movement, or bearing upward, and are as 
unlike this effect as weight is unlike the movement of falling. 
So in the elements of geometry the quality straightness and 
that of minimum length — duration or effort in traversing a line 
— are antecedent and consequent, or else concomitant qualities 
which are essentially different in their natures, but so intimately 
joined in all experience and in our conceptive powers, that 
they seem to be different aspects of one and the same nature. 
Yet the fully adequate and constructive definition of straight 
lines as a sort, of which only one can be drawn between two 
given points, does not imply that this is the shortest that can be 
drawn, or the one soonest and easiest traversed. This con- 
structive definition joined to the meaning of the word inclosure 
gives what is often regarded as an axiom, the more complex 
proposition, that two straight lines cannot inclose a space. 
Starting with these and other constructive definitions, with the 
most general axioms of quantity, and with postulates of con- 
struction, and combining them into more and more complex 
relations of magnitudes in extension, we arrive at geometrical 
theorems in which the protasis states the least possible that 
is essential as the cause, or reason, and the apodosis, or con- 
clusion, defines succinctly the consequent, or effect; theorems 
in which the connections of these two terms is far from obvious, 



412 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



but is nevertheless necessary, at least in the abstract, or on the 
supposition of precise, real definition and construction. Reason 
and consequent imply one the other, or the nature of a cause 
determines that of its effect, because one is analyzed into rela- 
tions already determined from fundamental propositions, and 
these relations serve to define, or constitute the other. It is 
not true in general that the effect is like its cause, or has a 
nature determined by that of its cause, but it is true that like 
causes produce like effects. Parents may be said with tolera- 
ble correctness to be the causes of their offspring resembling 
them, and hence in this case causes produce effects like them- 
selves; yet it is more correct to say that the offspring resemble 
their parents, because both are products, though successive 
ones, of similar real causes and processes, some of which in no- 
wise resemble or transfer their natures to their effects. Some 
implements and agents of the useful arts likewise are used to 
make precisely similar implements and agents, as a black- 
smith's hammer to produce a similar hammer, or fire to kindle 
another one, or to reproduce the easily ignited substances with 
which fires are kindled; yet in these cases the agent that pro- 
duces its like is not the whole of the cause of production. The 
blacksmith's forge and anvil and his arm and sight are con- 
causes or conditions of this reproduction: and the nature of 
these does not re-appear in the effect, unless, as w T e have said, 
there is added to the conception of the aggregate of conditions, 
namely, to the conception of the iron, forge, welding-hammer, 
arm and sight combined, also the fact that these will produce 
an effect resembling one of its conditions. So in organic re- 
production, the plant produces seed similar not to itself but to 
the seed from which it grew, and the new seed grows into a 
similar plant : and in this alternation in which the immediate 
cause really produces effects unlike itself there are many sub- 
ordinate conditions and processes the similarity of which in the 
parent and offspring makes them similar through successive 
effects of similar causes, which are not of the same nature as 
their effect. It is only because one condition or element of 
the cause (the one which resembles its effect) is singled out and, 
in accordance with the practical usage of common language, 



A FRAGMENT ON CAUSE AND EFFECT. 413 

is called the cause, on account of its prominence or conspicu- 
ousness, that it is at all proper to speak of the parent organ- 
ism as the cause of the production of its offspring. The ex- 
istence of the parent organism is a condition sine qua non of the 
production of its offspring, but there are other conditions 
equally indispensable, the natures of which in themselves are 
in no wise reproduced in the effects. — [1873.] 



JOHN STUART MILL— A COMMEMORATIVE 
NOTICE.* 

The name of John Stuart Mill is so intimately associated 
with most of the principal topics of modern philosophical dis- 
cussion, and with the gravest of open questions, with so many 
of the weightiest subjects of unsettled theory and practice, 
that it would be difficult to say for which of his many works 
his fame is at present the greatest or is most likely to endure. 
Those subjects in the treatment of which the originality of his 
position was the least were those in which the qualities most 
characteristic of him, and for which his writings have been 
most esteemed, appear in clearest light. Unlike most other 
great thinkers and masters of dialectics, he did not seek to dis- 
play what his own invention had contributed to the arguments, 
or his observation to the premises, in his discussion of philo- 
sophical and practical questions. On the contrary, he seemed 
to be indifferent to the appearance and reputation of originality, 
and actuated by a singleness of purpose and a loyalty to the 
views of his teachers in philosophy and science which were in- 
consistent with motives of personal vanity. The exercise of his 
admirably trained dialectical powers doubtless afforded him in- 
trinsic delight, the joy of play, or of spontaneity of power; but 
it was none the less always subordinated to moral purposes 
which were clearly defined in his youth, and loyally pursued 
through an active intellectual life for nearly half a century. 
But his broad practical aims were never allowed, on the other 
hand, to pervert the integrity and honesty of his intellect. 
Though an advocate all his life, urging reasons for unpopular 
measures of reform, and defenses of an unpopular philosophy 

* From the Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1873-74. 



JOHN STUART MILL. 4I tj 

or criticisms of the prevailing one, he was not led, as advocates 
too frequently are, to the indiscriminate invention and use of 
bad and good arguments. He weighed his arguments as dis- 
passionately as if his aim had been pure science. Rarely have 
strength of emotion and purpose and strength of intellect been 
combined in a thinker with such balance and harmony The 
strength of his moral emotions gave him insights or premises 
which had been overlooked by the previous thinkers . whose 
views he expounded or defended. This advantage over his 
predecessors was conspicuous in the form he gave to the util- 
itarian theory of moral principles, and in what was strictly 
original in his " Principles of Political Economy." 

In the latter, the two chief points of originality were, first, 
his treatment of the subject as a matter of pure abstract science, 
like geometry; or as an account of the means which are req- 
uisite to attain given ends in economics, or the cost needed to 
procure a given value, without bringing into the discussion the 
irrelevant practical questions, whether this cost should be in- 
curred, or whether the end were on the whole desirable. 
These questions really belong to other branches of practical 
philosophy, — to the sciences of legislation, politics, and morals, 
to which the principles of political economy stand in the rela- 
tion of an abstract science to sciences of applied principles and 
concrete matters. But, secondly, while thus limiting the prov- 
ince of this science, he introduced into it premises from the 
moral nature of man, by the omission of which previous writers 
had been led to conclusions in the science of a character gloomy 
and forbidding. The theory of population of Malthus, as 
elaborated by Ricardo, seemed to subject the human race to a 
hopeless necessity of poverty in the masses. Whether the 
principle of population did really necessitate this conclusion 
would depend, Mill taught, on more than the capacity of a 
soil to support a maximum population with the least subsistence 
needed for the labor of production. The principle applies 
without qualification to the animal world in general and to 
savage men; but not to progressive communities of men, in 
which foresight and prudence, with moral and social aspira- 
tions, are forces of more or less influence in checking increase 



4 i6 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIOXS. 

in population, and in improving the condition of the masses. 
The poorest, the most wretched, are not in the same condition 
of want in all communities of men. The poorest savage is 
objectively in a worse condition than the poorest civilized 
man. 

Mill did not oppose the views of his predecessors nor their 
manner of treatment, as so many other writers had done : he 
carried out their mode of regarding the science as a physical 
one, but with a thoroughness which brought to light considera- 
tions materially modifying their conclusions. The prospects 
of mankind are not hopeless, so long as men are capable of as- 
pirations, foresight and hope; though they may be gloomy 
enough in view of the slow working of these forces. What 
these forces have to oppose, however, is not the resistance of 
an immovable necessity, but only the force of inveterate cus- 
toms. To the sentimental objection that the laws of political 
economy are cruel, and therefore not true, Mill humorously 
replied that he knew of no law more cruel than that of gravity, 
which would put us all to death, were we not always and vigil- 
antly oh our guard against it. 

With a full, perhaps a too extreme appreciation of moral 
forces, as elements in the problems of Political Economy, Mill 
still treated the science as an abstract one ; as a science of con- 
ditional propositions, a science applicable to the practical prob- 
lems of morals and politics, but not in itself treating of them. 
For example, wars are expensive, and the establishment of a 
new industry is also an expense which the principles of political 
economy can estimate; but it does so without deciding wheth- 
er war or an industry ought under given circumstances to be 
undertaken. 

Moral forces are real agents affecting the future of the human 
race. As causes of effects, they are calculable forces, and as 
means to ends are proper subjects of the abstract science of 
political economy. It was because Mr. Mill believed in " mor- 
al causation " (the name he gave to what had indiscriminately 
been called the doctrine of necessity in human volition), and be- 
cause he himself was powerfully and predominantly actuated 
throughout his life by high moral considerations, that he gave 



JOHN STUART MILL. 41 7 

such emphasis to the moral elements in political economy, and 
made room for hope — for a sober, rational hope — respecting 
the practical conclusions and applications of the science ; seeing 
that hope can subsist with the desire that inspires it, provided 
the desire is instrumental in effecting what is hoped for. It was 
because he believed in " moral causation " that he treated po- 
litical science, in general, in the manner and by the methods of 
physical philosophy, or as a science of causes and effects. He 
believed that he himself and his generation would effect much 
for the future of mankind. His faith was that we live in times 
in which broad principles of justice, persistently proclaimed, 
end in carrying the world with them. 

His hopefulness, generosity, and courage, and a chivalric, 
almost romantic disposition in him, seemed to those least ac- 
quainted with him inconsistent w r ith the utilitarian philosophy 
of morals, w T hich he not only professed, but earnestly and even 
zealously maintained. The " greatest happiness principle " was 
with him a religious principle, to which every impulse in his 
nature, high or low, was subordinated. It was for him not only 
a test of rational rules of conduct (which is all that could be, 
or was, claimed for it in his philosophy of morals), but it be- 
came for him a leading motive and sanction of conduct in his 
theory of life. That other minds differently constituted would 
be most effectively influenced to the nobility of right conduct 
by other sanctions and motives, to which the utilitarian princi- 
ple ought to be regarded as only a remote philosophical test or 
rational standard, was what he believed and taught. Unlike 
Bentham, his master in practical philosophy, he felt no con- 
tempt for the claims of sentiment, and made no intolerant de- 
mand for toleration. He sincerely welcomed intelligent and 
earnest opposition with a deference due to truth itself, and to a 
just regard for the diversities in men's minds from differences 
of education and natural dispositions. These diversities even 
appeared to him essential to the completeness of the examina- 
tion which the evidences of truth demand. Opinions positive- 
ly erroneous, if intelligent and honest, are not without their 
value, since the progress of truth is a succession of mistakes 
and corrections. Truth itself, unassailed by erroneous opinion, 



4 i8 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

would soon degenerate into narrowness and error. The errors 
incident to individuality of mind and character are means, in 
the attrition of discussion, of keeping the truth bright and un- 
tarnished, and even of bringing its purity to light. The human 
mind cannot afford to forget its past aberrations. These, as 
well as its true discoveries, are indispensable guides; nor can 
it ever afford to begin from the starting-point in its search for 
truth, in accordance with the too confident method of more 
ambitious philosophers. 

Such being his loyalty and generosity, it is not surprising that 
Mill obtained a much wider acceptance of utilitarian doctrines, 
and a more intelligent recognition of their real import, than 
previous thinkers of his school had secured. He redeemed the 
word " utility " from the ill-repute into which it had fallen, and 
connected noble conceptions and motives with its philosophical 
meaning. It is now no longer a synonym of the ignoble or 
base, or the name of that quality in conduct, or in anything 
which conduces to the satisfaction of desires common to all 
men. He made it mean clearly the quality in human customs 
and rules of conduct which conduces to realize conditions and 
dispositions which for men (though not for swine) are practica- 
ble, and are the most desirable ; their desirableness being tested 
by the actual preference which those who possess them have 
for them as elements in their own happiness. This meaning of 
utility includes the highest motives in whose satisfaction an in- 
dividual's happiness can consist, and not the baser ones alone ; 
not even the base ones at all, so far as they obstruct the sources 
of a greater happiness than they can afford. It is now no 
longer a paradox to the intelligent student of Mill's philosophy, 
that he should prefer, as he has avowed, the worst evil which 
could be inflicted on him against his will, to the pains of a vol- 
untary sophistication of his intellect in respect to the more se- 
rious concerns of life. 

His method led him to conceal or at least subordinate to 
his single purpose most of what was original in his discussions 
of the various philosophical subjects to which he gave his at- 
tention. Yet his studies in logic, ethics, psychology, political 
economy and politics, and even in poetry, are full of valuable 



JOHN STUART MILL. 4I g 

and fertile contributions of original thought; and of that kind 
of service to philosophy which he most valued in such writers 
as Dr. Brown and Archbishop Whately, — a kind of service 
which he believed would survive the works of more learned 
and ambitious thinkers. A thorough preparation for his work, 
to which his education was directed by his father, realized 
what is rare in modern times, — a complete command of the art 
of dialectics; an art which he believed to be of the greatest 
service in the honest pursuit of truth, though liable to abuse at 
the hand of the dishonest advocate. His education was like 
that of an ancient .Greek philosopher, — by personal intercourse 
with other superior thinkers. He felt keenly in his later work, 
as Plato had, "how much more is to be learned by discussing 
with a man who can question and answer, than with a book 
which cannot." That he was not educated at a university, 
and through the influences of equals and coevals in intellectual 
and moral development, may account for one serious defect in 
his powers of observation, — a lack of sensibility to the differ- 
ences of character in men and between the sexes. So far as 
he did recognize these mental diversities, he prized them for 
the sake of truth, as he would have prized the addition of a 
new sense to the means of extending and testing knowledge. 
But he did not clearly discriminate what was really a reflection, 
as in a mirror, or a quick anticipation of his own thoughts in 
other minds, from true, and original observations by them. 
This may be accounted for in part by his philosophical habit, 
as has been observed, "of always keeping in view mind in the 
abstract, or men in the aggregate." Though he mingled in 
the affairs of life with other men, taking part in debates and 
discussions, private and public, by speech and by writing, all 
his life, his disposition was still essentially that of a recluse. 
He remained remote in his intellectual life from the minds and 
characters of those with whom he contended, though always 
loyal to those from whom his main doctrines, his education, 
and inspiration were derived. 

A natural consequence of his private education by a philos- 
opher (his father), and by intercourse with superior adult minds, 
like Bentham and the political economist Say, was that he 



4 2o PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

soon arrived at maturity, and was in full possession of his remark- 
able powers in early youth, able and eager to exercise them 
upon the most abtruse and difficult subjects. Annotations to 
Bentham's "Rationale of Judicial Evidence" was his first 
publicly acknowledged literary work, performed before he was 
yet of age; though contributions to the science of botany and 
other writings were labors of his youth. While still in his 
youth, before the age of thirty, he advocated reforms in an ar- 
ticle in the "Jurist" on "Corporation and Church Property,'' 
features of which became acknowledged principles of legisla- 
tion in Parliament many years later. He lived to see many of 
the reforms proposed by Bentham enacted as public law, and 
to take part in Parliament in the furtherance of some of his 
own political ideas. His courage and hopefulness were not 
quixotic, but were sustained by real successes. These qualities 
in his character, though perhaps properly described as roman- 
tic, or as springing from an ardent, emotional temperament, 
were always tempered by his cooler reason and by facts. In 
more than one division of special study in science and philos- 
ophy he mastered facts and details at first hand, or by his own 
observation; thus training his judgment and powers of imag- 
ination to those habits of accuracy so essential in a true edu- 
cation, by which knowledge more extensive, more or less super- 
ficial, and necessarily at second hand, can alone be adequate- 
ly comprehended. He was prepared for writing an important 
part of his great work on Logic by the study of the principles, 
requisites, and purposes of a rational classification in the prac- 
tical pursuit of botany, — a favorite pastime with him through- 
out his life. The use to him of this kind of knowledge, as of 
all other kinds worthy to be called science, was in its bearings 
on other and wider branches of knowledge. He generalized 
the principles exhibited in the natural system of botanical clas- 
sification to their application "to all cases in which mankind 
are called upon to bring the various parts of any extensive 
subject into mental co-ordination. They are as much to the 
point," he adds, "when objects are to be classed for purposes 
of art or business, as for those of science. The proper ar- 
rangement, for example, of a code of laws, depends on the 



JOHN STUART MILL. 42 i 

same scientific conditions as the classifications of natural his- 
tory; nor could there be a better preparatory discipline for that 
important function than the study of the principles of a natural 
arrangement, not only in the abstract, but in their actual ap- 
plications to the class of phenomena for which they were first 
elaborated, and which are still the best school for learning 
their use." To rightly divide and define is divine, said Plato; 
yet it is not an excellence by which the divine is distinguished 
from a human perfection. It is rather a perfection which is 
relative to human limits and weaknesses. 

The " mastery system " of studying a subject in its facts, and 
at first hand, was not liable with Mill to degenerate into the 
mere idiotic pursuit of facts, since the character of his mind 
was already determined by a strong philosophical bias. Even 
subjects like the fine arts, which are commonly and properly 
regarded as affording ends in themselves, or sufficient and 
worthy motives to study, interested Mill as affording broad 
principles and influences, extending beyond the immediate and 
present delight they inspire. In his readings of poetry he 
looked not merely for beauties or for sympathy, but for princi- 
ples, Causes, and influences; for the relations of it to the times 
in which it appeared. So wide was the range of his studies 
and his intellectual sympathies, that no writer has given wiser 
advice on the much debated subject of education, or advice 
more satisfactory to all parties, even to the advocates of special 
studies. 

Mr. Mill was a thinker about whose personal character and 
circumstances of education the student naturally seeks to learn. 
In such a thinker, these elements of power are instinctively felt 
to be of prime importance. They explain Mill's later influence 
at the universities, where, though not personally known, his 
effect upon the young men of the most active minds, through 
his principal works, his Political Economy and his System of 
Logic, became a powerful one, though purely spontaneous; 
for it did not come in by the normal channels of the curricu- 
lum. It was with men of the succeeding generation (as gen- 
erally happens with great innovators in science and philoso- 
phy) that his teachings were destined to be fully appreciated. 



422 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



But his teachings were none of them fundamentally new; or 
what was new in them was, or appeared to be, subordinate to 
what he had avowedly borrowed from previous thinkers. He 
was neither the author of a new system of philosophy, nor the 
discoverer of a new science. He can hardly be called, in 
strictness, the advocate even, of any previous doctrine in phi- 
losophy or science. It was one of his short-comings that he 
took for granted more than most of his readers knew. His 
starting-point was in advance of what most of them knew, and 
he was thus unintelligible to many of the best minds among 
his coevals. Starting from what many of them did not know, 
he completed, carried out, and put into a scientific form in his 
" System of Logic," and in his " Principles of Political Econo- 
my," the views he had adopted from his earlier teachers and 
from his later studies. 

It was through his masterly style of exposition and his skill 
in dialectics, and by other traits of a personal character to 
which active and original youth is especially alive, that he 
secured an unprejudiced hearing for doctrines in philosophy 
and practice which had almost ceased to have adherents. 
These doctrines had a century before, from the time of Locke 
(and before Hume had developed them with such alarming 
effect on existing beliefs), become an especially English philos- 
ophy; but had almost disappeared through the influence of 
the Scottish and German reactions against Hume. When his 
" System of Logic" was published, he stood almost alone in his 
opinions. The work was not written in exposition or defense 
of this philosophy, but in accordance with its tenets, which 
were thus reduced to a proximate application, or to a more 
determinate or concrete form. A qualified nominalism, thor- 
oughly English, and descended from the English schoolman 
William of Ockham, was its philosophical basis. He welcomed 
and introduced to English readers the revival of this phi- 
losophy in France, by Auguste Comte, with whom he agreed 
in many positions, — more especially in those which were not 
original with Comte. His accordance with Comte can hardly 
be regarded as one of discipleship, since in most important 
practical matters Mill dissented from the views of the French 



JOHN STUART MILL. 423 

philosopher. His real allegiance was to the once prevalent 
teachings of Locke, and to those of Berkeley, Hume, Brown, 
Hartley, and his father James Mill. 

Xo modern thinker has striven more faithfully to restore and 
build upon those speculations of the past, which appeared to 
him just and true, or more modestly to exhibit and acknowl- 
edge his indebtedness to previous thinkers; yet, by the excel- 
lence of his works, this past has fallen to the inheritance of his 
name and fame. To give scientific form or systematic coher- 
ency to views put forth unsystematically by others, was to give 
soul and life to doctrines wmich were thus made especially his 
own. The teachings of Sir John Herschel's celebrated "Dis- 
course on the Study of Natural Philosophy" were generalized 
by Mill into what is his most original contribution to logic, his 
theory of induction and of the inductive basis of all real truth. 
From this theory, important consequences were drawn as to 
the nature and function of syllogistic inference, — consequences 
from which the philosophical student remounts to the philoso- 
phy of experience and the teachings of Hume. From Hume 
and Brown, again, he derives his theory of causation, which he 
connects with other elements in his system, and with illustra- 
tions in science in a manner which has made the theory pecu- 
liarly his own. But it would be out of place in this notice to 
attempt an analysis of Mill's w r orks. Our task is only to ac- 
count for his influence. 

In politics he belonged to what is called the school of "phil- 
osophical radicals,'- who are, as he defined them, those wmo in 
politics follow the common manner of philosophers ; who trust 
neither to tradition nor to intuition for the warrant of political 
rights and duties, but base the right to power in the State on 
the ability to govern wisely and justly, and, seeing their coun- 
try badly governed, seek for the cause of this evil, and for 
means to remedy it. This cause they found to be in "the 
Aristocratical Principle," since, in the present imperfect condi- 
tion of human nature, no governing class would attend to 
those interests of the many which were in conflict with their 
own, or could be expected to give to any interests not their 
own any but a secondary consideration. The remedy for this 



424 



PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 



evil they found in a modified democratic principle ; namely, 
the better ability and disposition of the many to look after 
their own interests, than any dominant few could have, or 
would be likely to have, — provided the many, or their repre- 
sentatives, are enlightened enough to know their true interests 
and how to serve them. The motto of this radicalism was 
"Enmity to the Aristocratical Principle." From this creed 
sprung Mill's ardent hostility towards the South in their rebel- 
lion against our national government, and his hearty espousal 
of extreme anti-slavery views. 

But a democracy may be tyrannical towards minorities, and, 
if unchecked, is likely to become so; and, what is worse, is 
likely to become an unprincipled tyrant, less influenced by con- 
siderations of justice or prudence than a governing class would 
be. This fear made Mill distrust extreme forms of democracy 
and government by mere majorities. Accordingly, among his 
later works, his "Considerations on Representative Govern- 
ment" undertakes to devise checks to the abuse of power by ma- 
jorities. But it is evident that Mill's greatest trust was in those 
influences which have given to communities the ability, and 
thence the power and right, to govern themselves; namely, 
their intelligence and moral integrity, or that which reduces 
the necessity of government by force to the fewest functions 
and occasions. His famous essay on Liberty sought to estab- 
lish, on grounds of moral principle, restraints of governmental 
force, in whatever way it might be exercised, whether in the 
form of public law or of public opinion; neither of which in 
any form of government is. likely to be wiser beyond its proper 
sphere of duty than those it seeks to control. Government in 
advanced communities, capable of self-government, should not 
be of the parental type or degree of power. Coercion, which 
in itself is an evil, becomes a wrong, where persuasion, rational 
discussion, and conviction are capable of effecting the same 
ends, especially when these ends are less urgent than the need 
of security and self-protection in a community, for which it is 
the proper duty of government by force to provide. To place 
government in the hands of those sufficiently intelligent, whose 
true interests are most affected by it, and to limit its province 



JOHN STUART MILL. 42 $ 

and its functions as much as possible, leaving as much as pos- 
sible to non-coercive agencies, was the simple abstract creed 
of Mill's political philosophy. 

The essay on "Liberty" and his later essay on "The Sub- 
jection of Women" exhibit the ardent, emotional, enthusiastic, 
perhaps not the soundest, side of Mr. Mill's mental character 
and observation of human nature. Yet he cannot be said to 
have been without much experience in the practical art of 
government. He was in immediate charge of the " political 
department," so called, of the. East India House for more than 
twenty years. It was during this period, and in the midst of 
active employments, that his Logic and Political Economy 
were written. Both were thought out in the vigor of life and 
at the summit of his powers. His mind and pen were never 
idle. At about the age of fifty, he published selections from his 
occasional short writings for reviews. These had more than a 
passing interest, since in them, as in all his writings, great and 
often new principles of criticism are lucidly set forth. In all 
his writings, his judgments are valued by his readers, not as 
judgments on occasional matters by a current or conventional 
standard, but as tests and illustrations of new standards of criti- 
cism, which have a general and enduring interest, especially 
to the examining minds of youth. 

With a tact almost feminine, Mill avoided open war on ab- 
stract grounds. The principles of his philosophy were set forth 
in their applications, and were advocated by bringing them 
down in application to the common sense or instinctive, unan- 
alyzed judgments of his readers. His conclusions in psychol- 
ogy and on the fundamental principles of. philosophy were 
nowhere systematically set forth. In his Logic, they were 
rather assumed, and made the setting of his views of the sci- 
ence, than defended on general grounds ; though, from his 
criticisms of adverse views on the principles of Logic, it was 
sufficiently apparent what his philosophy and psychological 
doctrines were. 

English speaking and reading people had so completely for- 
gotten, or had so obscurely understood the arguments of their 
greatest thinkers, that the inroad of German speculation had 



42 6 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

almost overwhelmed the protest of these thinkers against the 
a priori philosophy. English-speaking people are not n eta- 
physical, and Mill respected their prejudice. But when the 
philosophy of Sir William Hamilton, professing to combine the 
Scottish and German reactions against Hume with what sci- 
ence had demonstrated as the necessary limits of human 
knowledge, was about to become the prevalent philosophy of 
England and America, it was not merely an opportunity, but 
almost a necessity, for the representative of the greatest En- 
glish thinkers (himself among the greatest), to re-examine the 
claims of the a priori philosophy, and either to acknowledge 
the failure of his own attempt to revive the doctrines of his 
predecessors, or to refute and overthrow their most powerful 
British antagonist. Accordingly Mill's "Examination of Sir 
William Hamilton's Philosophy," published in 1865, when he 
was nearly sixty years old, but in the full vigor and maturity 
of his powers, was his greatest effort in polemical writing. 
That the reputation of Sir William Hamilton as a thinker was 
greatly diminished by this examination cannot be doubted. 
Nor can it be doubted that the pendulum of philosophical 
opinion has begun, through Mill's clear expositions and vigor- 
ous defense of the Experience philosophy, to move again to- 
wards what was a century and a half ago the prevalent English 
philosophy. That its future movements will be less extreme in 
either direction, and that the amplitude of its oscillations have 
continually diminished in the past through the progress of 
philosophical discussion, w r ere beliefs with which his studies in 
philosophy and his generous hopefulness inspired him. Men 
are still born either Platonists or Aristotelians; but by their 
education through a more and more free and enlightened dis- 
cussion, and by progress in the sciences, they are restrained 
more and more from going to extremes in the directions of 
their native biases. 

In Mill's Examination of Hamilton, and in his last great 
work, the annotated edition of his father's "Analysis of the 
Phenomena of the Human Mind," many valuable subsidiary 
contributions are made to the sciences of logic and psychology. 
But in all his writings on these subjects his attention was di- 



JOHN STUART MILL. 42 y 

rected to their bearings on the traditional problems and discus- 
sions of general philosophy. The modern developments of 
psychology, as a branch of experimental science, and in con- 
nection with physiology, deeply interested him; but they did 
not engage him in their pursuit, although they promise much 
towards the solution of unsettled questions. His mental pow- 
ers were trained for a different though equally important service 
to science, — the service of clear and distinct thought, the un- 
derstanding, first of all, of that for which closer observation 
and the aid of experiment are needed; the precise compre- 
hension and pertinent putting of questions. The progress of 
science has not yet outgrown the need of guidance by the in- 
tellectual arts of logic and method, which are still equal in im- 
portance to those of experiment. The imagination of the sci- 
entific inquisitor of nature, the fertility of his invention, his 
ability to frame hypotheses or put pertinent questions, though 
still generally dependent on his good sense, and his practical 
training in experimental science, are susceptible, still of further- 
ance and improvement by the abstract studies of logic and 
method. Open questions on the psychological conditions of 
vision are to be settled, Mill thought, only when some one so 
unfortunate as to be born blind is fortunate enough to be born 
a philosopher. 

Mill has been aptly compared to Locke. Their philosophies 
were fundamentally the same. Both were " philosophical rad- 
icals " and political reformers. " What Locke was to the liberal 
movements of the seventeenth century, Mr. Mill has more than 
been to the liberal movement of the nineteenth century." He 
was born on the 20th of May, 1806, and died on the 8th of 
May, 1873 having nearly reached the age of sixty-seven. Pre- 
vious to the brief illness from which he died, he retained 
unimpaired his mental vigor and industry; and though it 
may not be said that he lived to see the hopes of his youth 
fully realized, yet his efforts have met with a degree of 
success in later years which he did not anticipate. His fol- 
lowers are still few both in politics and in philosophy. So far 
was he from restoring the doctrines of his school as the domi- 
nant philosophy of England, that, according to his own esti- 



428 PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSIONS. 

mate, " we may still count in England twenty a priori or spir- 
itualist philosophers for every partisan of the doctrine of Expe- 
rience."" But it was for the practical applications of this doc- 
trine in politics and in morals, rather than for the theoretical 
recognition of it in general, that he most earnestly strove; and 
we should probably find in England and America to-day a 
much larger proportion, among those holding meditated and 
deliberate opinions on practical matters, who are in these the 
disciples of Mill, than can be found among the students of ab- 
stract philosophy. 



INDEX 



Accident, meaning of, in science, 

131- 

Action at a distance, 391. 

voluntary, 220. 
Age, present, sceptical, 267. 
Agency, latent mental, 21 1. 
Alchemists, dreams of, 32. 
Algae, character of growth of, 321. 
Animals, do they reason ? 207. 

rational, 206. 
Antecedent and consequent, 410. 
A priori, meaning of the term, 373. 
Aristotle, cosmological doctrine 
of, 4. 

originator of syllogism, 360. 
Arrangement of leaves, spiral and 

whorl, 3i7-3!9- 
Articulation, not caused by selec- 
tion, 253. 
Assimilation, phenomena of, 41 1. 
Asteroids, do they exist in space ? 21. 
Atavism, 130. 

Bacon, separated physical science 
from scholastic philosophy, 

375- 
his distinguishing service, 375. 
Belief, disputes about the nature of, 

a matter for lexicographers, 

249. 
three metaphysical forms of, 

343- 

Biology, physical, 135. 

Brain, savage, larger than is neces- 
sary, 109. 
size of, in. 

Categories of human under- 
standing, 218. 
Causation, law of, universality of, 
9 note, 131. 
limits of, 71. 

mathematical conception of, 
409. 
Cause, how related to its effect, 245. 
result of the discovery of a, 408. 



Cause, in science does not imply or 
suggest its effect, 408. 

Cause and effect, essay on, 406. 

Causes, final, how the doccrine of 
is supported in natural sci- 
ence, 35. 
discussion of the doctrine of, 26, 
161. '*' 

from the point of view of the 
hypothesis of natural selec- 
tion, 101. 

Change, unchangeable laws of, 74. 

Classes, real kinds, 183. 

Comets, aphelia of, when most 
numerous, 12. 
two systems of, 13. 

Comte, on verification, 45. 

not the founder of the school 
of Tyndall, Huxley, Bain, 
and Darwin, 383. 

Concepts, 209. 

Conceptualists, 209. 

Consciousness, origin of, 115. 

Contradiction, of infinite and ab- 
solute, 355. 

Convictions, as used by Dr. McCosh, 

331- 

Cosmology, banished from scientific 

inquiry, 7. 
Counter-movements, principle of, 9. 
Cram, ability to, thought to be an 

element of success, 292. 
Cramming, what it is, 287. 
Curiosity, the cause of culture, 51. 
Cycle, a group of leaves, 302. 

denoted by fractions, 302. 

leaves of, how placed, 309. 

Darwin, extraordinary skill of, 97. 
effect of his work, 99. 
his Descent of Man, 138, 397. 
his Origin of Species, 126, 169. 
his Hypothesis of Pangenesis, 

i35- 

most consummate speculative 
genius, 136. 



43° 



INDEX. 



Darwin, his views concerning nat- 
ural selection, 138. 

Darwinism, German, 398. 

Democritus, why called an atheist, 
176. 

Derivation, 127. 

Development, 127. 

Devotion, uses of, 248. 

Diagrams, geometrical, a language, 
274. 

Differences, original cause, diver- 
gences of race, 251. 

Dimorphism, 186-189. 

Discipline, kind of, needed in uni- 
versities, 292. 

Distinction, abstract or metaphys- 
ical, 363. 
when valuable in classifica- 
tions, 370. 

Divergence, angle of, how meas- 
ured in plants, 302. 

Education, a science of, de- 
manded, 267. 
claims of university writers on 

the subject, 268. 
experiments in, valuable from 

their failures, 274. 
tests of courses proper to a 

general education, 272. 
two general features of a liberal 
education, 280. 
Effect, how related to its cause, 245. 
Ego, discussion of the, 228. 
Empiricists, 45. 
Equilibration, Spencer's theory of, 

80. 
Euclid, good results of the study 

of, 270. 
Evolution, according to Spencer, 
401. 
books relating to the theory 

of, 394. 
false conception conveyed by 

the term, 199. 
origin and value of the law of, 

69. 
prevalence of the doctrine not 
entirely due to Darwinism, 
128. 
two schools of, 398. 
obstacles to acceptance of the 

theory of, 6. 
reconciled with religious dog- 
mas, 127. 
common misconception of, 251. 
Examinations, university, their suc- 
cesses and failures, 271. 



Examinations, abuses of, 289. 

should be tests of memory and 
invention in their various 
orders, 290. 
Explanation, limits of, 247. 
two meanings of, 381. 

FORCE, four meanings of, in dy- 
namical science, 388. 
meaning of, when unqualified, 

389. 
conservation of, 79. 
not a necessary law of the 

universe, 12 1. 
persistence of, 78. 
Friction, not always a loss of force, 

27. _ 
Frond, spiral, two utilities of, 322. 

Gemmules, 165. 

cannot be divided, 166. 

Generalization, exists in animals, 
226. 

Geology, not a strictly positive 
science, 15. 
'•'illogical," 16. 

Geometry, modern, distinguished 
from ancient, 280. 

Gesture, language of, 254. 

Glands, mammary, Mivart on, 156. 

Gravitation, potential of, 19; fee- 
bleness of, 86. 

Gravity, universality of the law of, 
discovered by Newton, 73. 

Gray, Prof., his theory of variation, 
161. 

Hamilton, Sir William, 38, 63, 

240. 
Heat, what becomes of it, 23. 
mechanical theory of, 87. 
the sun's origin of, 82. 
two theories of, 82. 
Herschel, Sir William, nebular 

hypothesis of, I. 
History, written on dramatic prin- 
ciples, 71. 
Hypothesis, derivative, 8-16. 
development, 16. 
nebular, reason for its cordial 
reception, 2 ; discussion of, 
3; explains facts otherwise 
unaccounted for, 4; lacks 
antecedent probability, 6; its 
assumption not arbitrary, 10 ; 
criticized in detail, 1 1 ; one 
of its successes, 13 ; how 
regarded by physicists, 83. 



INDEX. 



431 



Hypotheses in science, value of 
discussion of rival, 169. 
mostly trial-questions, 384. 
have no place in experimental 

philosophy, 136. 
verification of, 45. 
Hypotheses non jingo, of Newton, 
48, 136. 

Idealism, theory of, 232. 
Idealists, views of, with regard to 

the natural subject, 230. 
Ideas, how developed, 47. 

innate, 59. 

scientific and religious, 40. 
Images as signs, 209. 
Imagination, highest faculty of, in- 
volves reason, 290. 

various orders of, 290. 

trained by mental discipline, 
290. 

pure, 211. 
Induction, as used by Aristotle, 371. 

scientific, work of, 71. 
Inquiries, ancient and modern, 48. 
Intelligence, animal, 210. 
Internodes, long, disadvantage in, 

3H- 
Intuition, 232, 372. 

Dr. McCosh on, 330. 

Investigators, modern scientific, 
skill of, 363. 

Knowledge, founded on observa- 
tion, 43. 

Language, artificial, 255. 
command of, 256. 
traced back by history, 264. 
traditions of, 289. 
two uses of, 255. 
Laplace, theory of origin of plan- 
ets, 2. 
Laws, universal, not to be discov- 
ered by finite intellects, 229. 
Leaf, arrangements of, 300. 
uses of, 315. 

utilities of expansion of, 321. 
Lewes, George Henry, a meta- 
physician, 368. 
his Problems of Life and 
Mind, 360. 
Light, first forms of, 164. 
what becomes of it, 23. 

M ansel, Dr., reply to Mill, 350. 
Mass, nebulous, rotatory motion 
of, 2. 



Masson, David, aim of, 342. 

his three metaphysical forms 

of belief, 343. 
metaphysical motives of, 342. 
his Recent British philosophy, 

342. 
scheme of, 343. 
Mathematics, 273. 

dangers of the display of 

artistic skill in, 277. 
deficiency of, as a means of 

discipline, 280. 
remedies for the defects in 

examination, 284. 
its supposed value for develop- 
ing habits of accuracy delu- 
sive, 279. 
Mayer, Dr., theory of sun-heat, 82. 
McCosh, Dr., follower of Bacon, 

378- 
mistakes of, 383. 
on intuitions, 330. 
treatment of his opponents, 

377- 
on Tyndall, 375. 
system of, 330-333. 
Memory, discussion of, 288. 

in the more intelligent animals ; 

in man, 219. 
of various orders, 290. 
over- cultivated, 289. 
retentiveness of, 288. 
lower orders of, how improved, 

294. 
Metaphysics, demands of, 246. 
methods of, 366-400. 
term often discarded, 361. 
mystical, how met by scientific 

inquiries, 204. 
Metempirics, 366, 370. 
Meteors, 26. 

Method, no new discoveries in, 48. 
difference between ancient and 

modern. 40. 
objective and subjective, 46. 
Mill, John Stuart, notice of, 414. 
aim of, 355. 
education of, 419. 
essays of, on liberty and sub- 
jection of women, 425. 
examination of Hamilton's 

philosophy, 426. 
experience in government, 425. 
faith of, 417. 
indifferent to a reputation foi 

originality, 414. 
method of, 418. 
compared to Locke, 427. 



43 2 



INDEX. 



Mill, John Stuart, political economy 
of, 415-417. 
position of, in politics, 423. 
reasons for the anti- slavery- 
views of, 424. 
theory of population of, 415. 
two points of originality of, 415. 
Mind, human, not a product of nat- 
ural selection, 104. 
Minds, eminent, superiority of, due 

to power of attention, 293. 
Mivart, St. George, misconceptions 
of, 141, 147. 
on the genesis of species, 129. 
opposes Darwin, 129. 
Modification, descent with, 168. 
Molecules, distinction in, 367. 

sizes of, 166. 
Motive, objective and subjective, 49. 
Motives, non-utilitarian, how use- 
ful, 282. 
Mystery, uses of, 248. 
Mysticism, nature of, 203. 

still prevails in mental philos- 
ophy, 203. 

Names, designations of things, 237. 
what they suggest, 212. 
abstract, 236. 
Nature, highest products of, not the 
results of the mere forces of 
inheritance, 159. 
knowledge of, how obtained, 

47- 
meaning of, in science, 202. 
Nebulosity, distribution of, I. 

two grounds for belief in, 5. 
Newton, not the discoverer of the 

law of gravity, but of its uni- 

sality, 73. 
Nominalists, 209. 
Non ego, 228. 
Noumena, why invented, 247. 

Ontology, discussion and mean- 
ing of, 344. 
often discarded, 361. 
Organic types, theory of, 297. 
Orion, example of nebular hypoth- 



Paley, 35. 

Pangenesis, hypothesis of, 135. 

why invented, 164. 
Perception, in the brain, 232. 

object of, 233. 
Philosophers, fundamental division 
of, 343- 



Philosophy, classed with religions 
and the fine arts, 52. 

questions of, 50. 

three plans of, 53. 

experimental, 131. 

natural, constitution of, 132. 

object of, 161. 
Phyllotaxy, 300. 

problem of, 303. 
Physiology, general, 135. 
Planets, causes of mean distances 
of, 29. 

relation of, to meteoric system, 
27. 
Plants, cyclic character of, 327. 

leaves of, 296. 
Platonists, 45. 
Poets, 250. 

Polymorphism, 186, 189. 
Power, definition of, 18. 

manifestations of, 19. 
Prevision, power of, best test of the 

truth of a theory, 102. 
Ptolemy, aim of his research, 47. 

Question, purpose of, 247. 

Race, human, distinction of, 254. • 

Races, savage, why they remain so, 
250. 

Radicals, philosophical, in politics, 
423. 

Realism, closely allied to tran- 
scendentalism, 363. 

Realists, natural, appeal to common 
sense, 230. 
not evolutionists, 231. 

Reality, tests of, 184. 

Repetition, two modes of, 288. 

Reproduction, phenomena of, illus- 
trations of cause and effect, 
410. 

Research, modern scientific, supe- 
riority of, 45. 

Reversion, 130. 

Saturn, rings of, 30. 

Science, ancient and modern, 46. 

definition of, 205. 

every student of, a positivist, 

SOS- 
experiments in, 273. 
modern, origin of, 50. 
no burdens of proof in, 170. 
objective value of, 281. 
progress of, 43. 

repudiates scholastic classifica- 
tions, 408. 



INDEX. 



433 



Science, utilitarian value of, 282. 
Segmentation, in plants, 322. 
Selection, natural, an economical 
process, 253. 
consistent with natural the- 
ology, 100. 
evolution by, 168. 
first example of, 149. 
insufficiency of, 153. 
limits of, 97. 
Mivart's views of, 132. 
most important means of mod- 
ification, 171. 
not concerned in the first pro- 
duction of any form, 252. 
not limited to origin of species, 

114. 
reception of, 98. 
what is claimed for it, 19 1. 
. its value as a working hy- 
pothesis, 296. 
what it accounts for, 182. 
sexual, 157. 
Self-consciousness, evolution of, 
199. 
theory of, 251. 
Sensation, seat of, 233. 

how determined, 234. 
Signs, mental, 211. 
Similarity, associations of, 291. 
Sophia, Aristotle's idea of, 361. 
Species, how fixed, 182. 
genesis of, 126. 
Mivart's proofs of, 133. 
stability of, 143. 
Speculations, cosmical, 19. 

motives of, 49. 
Spencer, Herbert, 11. 

career and character of, 56. 
doctrine of the unknowable of, 

91. 
"Descriptive Geometry" of, 

90. 
evolution, theory of, 67. 
inductions of, 72. 
not a materialist, 75. 
" not a positivist, 55. 
philosophy of, 43. 
" Principles of Biology " of, 68. 
"Principles of Psychology" 

of, 57- 
"Social Statics" of, 56, 67. 
test of truth of, 58. 
incompetency of, 96. 
Spiral, meaning of, 316. 
Sports, athletic, value of, for men- 
tal training, 278. 
Studies, conflict of, 267. 
disciplinary, 277. 



Study, importance of, often con- 
founded with examination- 
value, 273. 
modes of, involve repetition, 

288. 
motives to, 286. 
Structures, adaptive, 297. 
genetic, 297. 

independent similarities of, not 
accounted for by theory of 
natural selection, 159. 
Substance, conception of, 235. 
Sun spots, cause of, 31. 
Sun, energies of, how expended, 83. 
System, solar, constitution of, 9. 
a natural product, 17. 

Teaching, natural genius for, 
powerless to reproduce it- 
self, 271. 
Teleology, 70. 

Theology, natural, as positive sci- 
ence, 33. 
teachings of, superstitious, 40. 
Theory, physical, of the universe, I. 
Thinkers, when materialists, 407. 

rank of, how determined, 361. 
Thought, action of, 210. 
Transmutation, 127. 
Truth, condition of the belief in, 3. 
Tyndall, Prof., on heat of sun, 20. 

McCosh on, 375. 
Types, theory of, adapted to theory 
of final causes, 299. 
cause of prevalence of, 299. 
opposition of, to scientific in- 
quiries, 299. 

Universities, failures and duties 
of, 267. 

obligations of, 283. 

reform required, 286. 
Utility, effect of, on life of a race, 

H3- 
of bodily structures, 151, 153, 
' 158. 

of knowledge, 282. 
Mill's view of, 418. 

Value, Todhunter's standard of, 

in university studies, 271. 
Values, examination, of modern 

studies, 272. 
Variation, as a phenomenon of or- 
ganization, 181. 
reversional, 132. 
unexplained facts of, 129. 
Veracity, not an original moral 
instinct, 113. 



434 



INDEX. 



Verification, principle of, 46. 
Volition, misinterpretation of, 233. 

an action through memory, 264. 

conscious phenomena of, 122. 

Wallace, A. R., his Contributions 
to the Theory of Natural 
Selection, 98. 

Weather, cosmical, 10. 

Will, the, an absolute source of 
physical energy, 121. 



Will, not a measurable quantity of 
energy, but an incident force, 
119. 
Words, as used by barbarians, 235. 
Wright, Chauncey, biographical 
. sketch of, vii. 
attainments of, xxiii. 
genius of, xiii. 

in what sense a positivist, xviii. 
writings of, xx. 

Zeno, paradox of motion of, 385. 



THE END. 



WW -1 1944 



